A Habit of Force
by G.E Waldo
Summary: WARNING!: This story is Rodney-mpreg, Rodney/Kolya, Rodney/Ronan-Sheppard-Beckett. Angst, violence. Adult! (Character death of all female characters)
1. Chapter 1

**A Habit of Force**

G.E. Waldo

WARNING!: This story is Rodney-mpreg, Rodney/Kolya, Rodney/Ronan-Sheppard-Beckett. Angst, violence. Adult!

_Beat your fists upon Death, and rage in His ear your song. No spirit so enduring as mortal mans, should swift to the mound pass along. G.E Waldo_

SGASGASGASGASGASGASGA

Weir took up his offered hand in hers, not so easy with her weakness and the awkward rubber barrier between his fingers and hers.

John Sheppard, sweating inside the suit so his hair stuck to his forehead, his face obscured by the oxygen mask, squeezed back. Her hands were little more than bones now and he could hardly see for the tears he refused to shed. The last thing he wanted was Elizabeth to die seeing his face twisted in grief instead of the reassuring calm he thought would maintain her...wherever she may be going. As a military man Sheppard had never let himself dwell too much on what might be coming.._.after_, but if anyone deserved a heavenly city made of gold and jewels surrounded by shimmering sights and high white clouds, it was her.

After all, a beautiful city under another the sky was where she had lived in_ this_ life.

Elizabeth spoke, her voice thin like a reed in the wind. "I want you to take care of everyone here, John. These people trust you, they...they love you." She rolled her head back and forth as though reliving memories she could hardly believe had happened because life went by so fast, so fast, and when death came it was there at the door like the long shadow of evening, cold and un-shifting until the dark took you away. Being the powerful woman she was, however, she still fought against it with every breath because there was still so much to say and do if her body would have let her.

But all that was free in her now was words. "I knew you were the right choice, the right man for the job, the minute I met you, back on Earth...I just _knew_ it. Do you remember that first day, when all of this was still new and exciting? How thrilled we all were? That first step through the Gate, the first breaths we took in Atlantis...how _beautiful_ it was."

Calm assurance, never letting her hand go, not even once. "I remember." How could he forget? A whole other world, one beyond his own, had opened up to him that day. The Stargate, Atlantis, other planets, other peoples, Rodney McKay...and then the Wraith and more death and struggle than he had ever faced at home. But still worth it, every minute, every sacrifice, all worth it.

All except for this. If he could turn back the clock and never send Lorne's team to that world...

"I _love_ these people," she whispered. Then urgently "Promise me, John." Weir said, shaking his hand just a little. She could only move so much now. Too much movement and she would be gasping for air. "Promise me you'll take care of them."

Everyone...take care of everyone. Fewer than before but still so many... Sheppard stared down into the fading sight of one the people he respected most in the universe. "I promise."

Cut off from Earth to prevent the contagion from making it home, Atlantis was all his now. He _so_ did not feel up to it. Almost half, that is what they were swiftly losing, almost half their population - all the women. Not one had been spared, not even the children. Not even Teyla and when she had become ill it had been the lowest blow to their spirits. Teyla, so strong and everyone confident of her staying power; had turned out to be as vulnerable as the rest.

But this woman...Sheppard railed against it as though Fate itself was standing on their shoulders, laughing a deep belly laugh at the pathetic weakling humans who thought they could conquer a galaxy not their own. So many deaths now that he would have sacrificed almost anything to prevent them. But to see this woman fall ill was almost doing him in, and so he gripped her fingers trying to drive the sickness away through sheer force of will because it was impossible that they should be losing this woman. Not Elizabeth - Christ, Pegasus, Brahma, Karma - who-ever – not _her_! Don't take _this _one, _please... _

But today it was Elizabeth and she had already admitted it to herself though she knew John was yet there beside her. Time was short now so she hurried to speak to him of those under her, though her voice scratchy and small it was filled with warmth as though she were speaking of her own children.

"These people of mine...make sure Chuck knows where the files are for the Athosians and the other colonies, and thank Carson for all his work – make sure he understands that _none_ of this was his fault - _none_ of it - and make sure to tell Ronan how glad I am that he decided to stay and help us, how much we still need him and that this is his home and tell Rodney -" she bit her lip. Always she had kept a soft spot for her most brilliant, and most frustrating, scientist. "Tell Rodney how much I'll miss him and that we love him...and take _care_ of him, John. He's not like you and me, you know. He so smart it's scary but he doesn't stand well on his own...especially after...after Jennifer..."

Jennifer had been among the first to die and John had watched his best friend, the smartest guy in two galaxies, the man who used sarcasm as a fine instrument, as a shield and sword against all odds –

Fall apart.

"He still needs our help..." Still she spoke as though she were going to be around to lend it. Still, as terribly sick as she was, Elizabeth fought against the inevitable. How were they ever going to continue without her at the helm? "He needs us, John, even if he doesn't know it. Rodney needs us..._y-you_."

Sheppard nodded, not trusting himself to speak without his voice betraying how much this was cutting him in half. _I need __**you**_ he desperately wanted to tell her, knowing it would be unfair to place such a burden on her thin shoulders, especially now. Why hadn't he told her years ago how much she meant to him? Why had he never _done_ that?

He wished he could now. He wished he could be stronger. "Yes," Sheppard finally managed to say. "Yes, I will."

"And -" but another seizure took her away from him and her body shook and jerked as though it wanted to fly apart. And then she was still.

Sheppard waited but her chest did not begin to rise again. He screamed into his ear bug and other suited people entered the room via the decontamination unit, too slow, all of them too slow. They shocked her heart and applied pure oxygen but still her chest did not rise.

Never again.

XXX

Once SGC had become aware of the seriousness of the illness, they sent through the Stargate as many supplies as could be gathered for anything Atlantis might need, and then shut the address to Atlantis down.

On the control room's main screen John nodded to Landry, the old man's face a grave mask of concern. "You have our deepest condolences on the loss of Doctor Weir, Colonel. And we regret this decision but we must now make any passage to Earth forbidden until this illness can be contained. Any spread of the infection to Earth would be catastrophic."

Sheppard nodded. It was all looking at him now, all the responsibility, all the people, all the faces left behind, all the hope that not any more would follow Elizabeth to the incinerator. "I understand General."

"One way shipments only, Colonel, if or when you need any further assistance, and the highest containment measures will remain in effect indefinitely when using the Gate from our end. We can't afford to allow even a single cell of this contagion to cross into the Milky Way."

"I agree with the precautions General. Thank you."

Landry dropped the formalities. "John, our scientists realise what this could mean to the expedition, indeed to any planet in the Pegasus galaxy should this infection spread beyond it. All I can say is take care of yourselves and keep us updated."

"I will General. Atlantis out."

XXX

Sheppard retreated to Weir's –_ his_ – office and, somewhat reluctantly, sat down in the well padded swivel chair behind the kidney-shaped desk. Her things still sat on it as he had not had the heart to remove them yet. There was no need really; Elizabeth had never been a clutter-bug.

Although the door was open, there was a knock and when Sheppard looked up Beckett stepped into the room. "Just thought you'd want to know – Dora Malierous died this morning. About an hour ago."

Sheppard nodded. That was four since only last night. That left exactly nine women left in all of Atlantis and on the mainland who were sick but had not yet succumbed. "Any progress on what this might be?"

Carson sat heavily in the chair. When he had heard of Jennifer Keller's death, he had volunteered to return to Atlantis to help. What he had not counted on was being marooned here because of the illness itself which had thus far left the male population unscathed though the risk that they might be carriers made any return to Earth impossible.

Beckett rubbed at his face. "Only that it responds to nothing. I've never seen anything like this. I've never seen anything work the way this contagion works: starving the cells, killing its host so effectively. Antibiotics don't even begin to touch it. Er - I'm sorry I couldn't attend the service."

Sheppard understood. Beckett's infirmary was full to bursting with the sick. He had no spare minutes to waste mourning the dead, even Elizabeth, when there were sick people to try and save. "What about those on the mainland?"

"They won't come to Atlantis. Most of the leader's think this is something we brought from Earth, that it's our fault, or maybe something the Replicators engineered."

If it were true, it was a brilliant way to wipe out an enemy: make it impossible for that enemy to reproduce itself and then sit back as the remainder died of old age. "I don't know about the Replicators but it certainly wasn't the Wraith." The Wraith would never attempt to wipe out their only food source.

"By the way, Rodney hasn't been by to see me in a couple of days to get his pill."

Sheppard heaved himself to sore feet. The last thing they needed was an even more depressed lead scientist. "I'll talk to him."

Beckett stood. "Thank you, Colonel. I hate to bring it to you, but I think over time the medication will help him. It's just a bugger making the lad take it."

Rodney was no more a lad than any of them anymore, but he still sometimes acted like a child. No one wanted to be thought of as vulnerable during such a crisis, and even though McKay might see himself as some sort of scientific super-genius, he was no different than anyone else. "He'll take it."

XXX

"You didn't come to the service." Sheppard said as he stepped into the room, and then slouched against the door, crossing his arms. Not all the way into the room. Keeping his distance. "You've got to stop hiding away in here, Rodney."

At the mention of Elizabeth's funeral service, Rodney wiped away the few angry tears that had already begun to leak. "I'm not hiding away. Some of us have work to do."

"Elizabeth was your friend."

"Elizabeth was everybody's friend." But his face said he knew. God how he knew that another of the people he most respected and cared for was now dead. Uselessly. McKay turned his face to the wall. That was what he did now, instead of his wit or his biting remarks he would simply shut down and look elsewhere. Sheppard had begun to fear that losing them all, especially Jennifer and now perhaps even more critically, Elizabeth's death had taken an irreplaceable toll out of Rodney, that he might be this time unfixable.

Rodney had never dealt well with death. The man gave his friendship and trust to people with trepidation, but once established became emotionally tethered to them, tied in, devoted. And unbreakably loyal.

Sheppard's military training had spared him the worst of the grief he now observed pouring out of others. In some a trickle, in others a broken main but in Rodney...in Rodney he feared the dam might have crumbled.

Sheppard dug in his pocket, holding out Carson's little pill of happiness on his palm. "You forgot to take this - again."

McKay glanced at it and then turned his nose up. "I don't need those anymore. I'm fine. Besides they cloud my thinking and make it harder for me to do my job."

Sheppard didn't think it would be that easy. "Right – fine. Hiding away in your lab pretending that..." He walked over and stole a look at Rodney's computer screen, "re-routing the desalinated water into the secondary pipes for the scrubbers" is a terribly important job right now."

"Yeah, it_ is_ - unless you're into salty showers."

"Look, Rodney..." Sheppard placed a hand on Rodney's shoulder which he immediately shook off.

McKay snarled "Stop trying to coddle me, I'm not a child."

"Then stop acting like one." Sheppard slammed the pill down on the table in front of the stubborn scientist. "Look you are _not_ the only one hurting here." No family for him had been lost but losing _Teyla_...Teyla's death had been bad enough but now Elizabeth...

Elizabeth.

_Gone!_

He could still feel her hand in his, still hear her kind words, feel her soft breath on his face. To think he'll never see her again, never share a moment of laughter, a passing joke about McKay or Zelenka, never again seek each other's support...it seemed unreal. She had slipped into his soul so easily, fitting him like a glove. Perhaps because she had been the diplomatic equivalent of him; a leader, independent without being aloof, reliable, one who loved her work and fought tooth and nail for those under her if she thought the cause was worthy. Sheppard felt like ripping into anyone whom he thought could tolerate it, which meant no-one.

In that moment staring at Rodney's very obvious grief, he wasn't positive he could do it. He didn't want to _have_ to go on without Elizabeth having his back. He was going to miss her like a cat misses its corner of the couch. She had _nourished _them - all of them. He couldn't even quit because there was no way to go home anymore, the SGC didn't want a group of Typhoid Mary's infecting Earth. They were all stuck with Pegasus and cursed with Atlantis. "Everybody's lost someone, so for once stop thinking about yourself and take your damn _pill_."

Sheppard stormed out of the room, hardly keeping his hands from physically lashing out. As bad a shape as the scientist was in, he wasn't doing so hot either and had no strength to try and gather up the broken pieces of McKay.

Not right now.

XXX

Sheppard, his fists driving into the heavy bag like hammers, unrelenting abuse, unstopping, and still the anger, the betrayal of Pegasus weighed in. It had been days and days since Elizabeth's service and still he was suffocating, knowing what lay ahead. They were on their own and the people of Atlantis, those left alive, all knew it too. What they didn't know was their leader didn't feel capable of leading them.

His hands hurt like hell and still he punched the padded leather, not caring. The pain was a distraction at least.

"_Colonel Sheppard." _

Sheppard ignored the voice for a moment. Beckett's voice over his ear bug, the doctor probably needing he-didn't-give-a-fuck.

"_Colonel Sheppard, we have a situation."_

Sheppard landed one final blow to the punching bag, sending it hard over and back. Letting his hands drop for a moment, he blew air a few times and then tapped his ear bug, wishing he'd left the damn thing in his quarters. "What?"_ Fuck_ pleasantness too.

"_I've had several men report to the infirmary in the last hour, all showing similar symptoms."_

_Oh Jesus_. "Similar to...?"

"_So far, yes, flu-like but I don't wanta' say anything more over the comm." _

Sheppard grabbed a towel and wiped his face and neck as he left the gym for Beckett's domain. "On my way."

XXX

Sheppard didn't bother greeting any of Beckett's now short-staffed male nurses and the doctor saved him the trouble of actively looking through all the rooms by appearing almost immediately from behind a curtain. "Colonel Sheppard." Beckett lifted his chin for Sheppard to follow him a few steps away from any patient.

With sweat drying n his skin and making him itch, Sheppard just let the physician talk.

"Four men have been admitted with symptoms very similar to the infection that killed the women." Whispering, Beckett showed Sheppard a small chart. "High fever, abdominal pain, weakness, lethargy and mental confusion."

"Are you sure this is the same infection."

"While I'd like to say for certain that it is _not _but it's too early to tell. While I wait for the cultures, I'll keep you informed but if it was it really should have hit us all by now; we ought to have been dying off along with the female population."

Sheppard nodded. His thoughts too. "So what could it be if it's not that?"

"That I don't know yet but if whatever it is it is most likely airborne, so we've all been exposed."

He nodded, keeping his eyes on the meaningless scribbles on the chart. With nothing to offer in the way of suggestions or encouragement Sheppard said "Keep me informed." Insert Useless Standby Phrase Here. Whatever happened in the infirmary it would be Beckett at the helm to deal with it, not him. He was of no use here.

XXX

Beckett entered Sheppard's office and noted the absence of Elizabeth's Weir's things. It was two weeks since her death and Colonel Sheppard had finally gotten the point that she was not coming back. Removing her personal items was only a healthy choice as far as his opinion went, which was probably not beyond the chair he sat down in. "The lab has come back with some startling results from the blood and tissue tests on the virus, the one that killed the women that is, not this most recent illness affecting the men." He looked up from his notes. "You're not going to like what I have to tell you."

Sheppard asked a strange casualness to his tone "Are we all dead?"

Beckett supposed it was part of command to expect the worst. No point in preparing for the best of things. The best of anything hardly ever showed its face in Atlantis. "Er - no. But the virus that infected and killed all the women in Atlantis, the main-land and as far as we can tell, many of the worlds we have encountered during our time here, shows signs of nanite energy meaning this virus is not a naturally occurring one."

Sheppard sat up straighter and his tone changed rapidly. "Are you saying...?"

"Yes, this was manufactured, probably by the Replicators and probably as a method of ridding themselves of us by preventing natural human reproduction."

It was brilliant. All the Replicating pricks had to invest really was time. "Kill the women, kill the species."

"Yes."

"What about the sick men?"

"It's not_ that_ virus, of that we're sure now, but what it is...we haven't been able to narrow down...a virus, infection, parasite...we've no idea. Not yet. Some of them are feeling a site better, though others are still fevered and have the abdominal pain. I've ordered a series of comprehensive scans to try and pinpoint the cause of their discomfort. Hopefully that'll tell us more."

Sheppard nodded. "Okay." Then he figured it was time to find out about one man on his staff who had become a bit of a hermit of late and more so since his outburst. "Rodney?" He knew Beckett would know what he was talking about.

"He's still coming in regularly for his medication and seems...perhaps a bit better. It's hard to tell with him, he used to be so in your face with every thought that popped into his head but now..."

Yes, now.

Now McKay hardly spoke a word and when he did it was the bare minimum to his staff and hardly another soul. Profound depression the city's psychologist had labeled it. The only treatment: medication and time. Sheppard knew it was unfair of him to have expected McKay to self repair faster than he currently was. The man had survived Wraith, Genii, Replicators, drowning, disease and the loss of his reputation at one time or another. As a mathematician sitting in a lab he had suffered more than his fair share of what the Pegasus galaxy had thrown at them, and come back from them all as strong as ever.

It was unsettling to know that Rodney McKay could be broken emotionally from the death of a woman he had dated for all of six months.

As though reading his thoughts Beckett said "The lad doesn't give of himself lightly, Colonel, you are aware of that – aren't ye'?"

Sheppard knew it of course. When Rodney had an idea he obsessed and ran with it until he either proved it or it nearly killed him. When he fell in love, Sheppard supposed he should not be surprised that it was no different. When McKay set his heart on something or someone, _really_ set his heart on it, he didn't turn back. The Arcturus project had proved that pretty clearly as had the scientists' run-in with the lethal Kolya and a half dozen other dire situations that had called for extreme measures.

"Rodney will be all right." Sheppard said it to help make it a truth he could believe in. "He always is." He _had_ to be all right. Sheppard was feeling the sting of isolation. He missed his friend.

"It wouldn't hurt him to have a friend I don't imagine and you know he...can't be the one to reach out." Rodney was almost as buried in denial as was his Colonel, Beckett thought not for the first time.

Sheppard knew it. Basically he had an apology to make. "I think I'll check on him, thanks Carson. Let me know about the men."

"As soon as I know anything."

XXX

But Rodney was not in his quarters. Poking his head in through the door to McKay's lab he noticed Zelenka was the sole occupant. "Have you seen Rodney?"

Zelenka looked up from his work, quick to let out a sigh of relief that it was the colonel and not his moody boss. "He left about an hour ago, said he wasn't feeling well. I assume he went to his quarters."

Sheppard shook his head. "I was just there. If you see him tell him I'm looking for him."

"I will do that Colonel."

XXX

Beckett was surprised to find Rodney at his door. "Carson do you have something you can give me for a headache?"

Carson turned from the CT images on the light panel and opened a small cupboard with a key on a chain, one he kept tucked inside his doctor's coat. "Tylenol is about all I can give you for that but are you experiencing any other discomfort? Pain, weakness, dizziness...?"

Rodney shook his head and lied "No." He did not want to be stuck beneath Carson's medieval probes for the afternoon. If he got worse he'd come back, if he didn't so much the better. His stomach felt tender, that was all. Probably the result from the tossing and turning he'd done all night. His rooms were too damn hot and the next thing he was going to do was speak to Zelenka about it. Couldn't his team keep even the simplest systems from going wacky without his constant supervision?

"Are you sure? You look a little flushed."

But Rodney, palming the pills, was already backing away, out of the reach of Beckett and his needles and other pokey things. "Nope, I'm fine. Thanks Carson."

When he was gone, one of Beckett's two lab assistants, Sy Peters, his most accomplished chemist, approached him and handed him a folder. "I think you need to read this Doctor."

Beckett eased his tired body into his desk chair and opened the file. After reading for a few minutes he sat back like a man who'd just read his own obituary. He radioed Sheppard.

XXX

Rodney curled up on his bed, clutching at his abdomen, the pain was intense and now that he understood he was sick he knew there'd be hell to pay by keeping it from Carson. If he could just get to sleep for a while it would pass. He had no fever so he was sure he wasn't ill like the other men, certain it was just something he'd eaten or too much work and worry. Tension - that was it. Too much tension and bad food.

If Jennifer were here, she'd rub his back and help him sleep. He missed having her in his bed so much but angrily blinked away the tears that threatened to form whenever he let his mind wander to memories of her pretty face. Finally, after a while, the pain eased and then disappeared altogether. Rodney fell into a light sleep.

XXX

Beckett showed the results to Sheppard but explained knowing the Colonel wasn't privy to medical lingo and chemist equations. "There's something happening to these men and it's a bit weird. All of them are showing elevated levels of progesterone, that's a reproductive hormone, and the scans I just finished examining suggest something is going on inside them, in their lower abdomen, but it's too soon to tell just what. Growths, unusual blood vessels, small masses of what we don't yet know."

"Are we talking cancer?"

Beckett shook his head, frustrated by his own lack of progress on any sort of definitive diagnosis. He rubbed his hair "We just don't know yet. It's possible although _none_ of the men are showing elevated white count which is one of the first indicators of a sarcoma or a blood disorder. Until we can get some better pictures of what's happening inside them we won't know. I'll need one of the men to volunteer to undergo a biopsy so we can get a sample."

"How many men so far?"

"Still holding at nineteen. No new cases and that's another thing that tells me it's not viral or any infectious agent. These men are from all professions and work in different parts of Atlantis. If this was some sort of mutated version of what killed all the women more of us would be ill by now. It doesn't mean it couldn't be a different virus, an unknown one, but their symptoms are not typical of any influenza or rhinovirus. In some of them their fevers are gone, in others it persists, some are experiencing less pain as the hours go by, others are holding steady. None of it makes sense."

Sheppard knew that four of those men were from among his teams. "How is Stackhouse doing?"

"Much like the others."

"I'd like to see him."

"Of course, no one is in isolation now – there's no point at this stage. Whatever this is, whoever it was going to infect, it seems to me that has already infected. He's back here." Beckett led Sheppard to one of many beds lined up in the sick ward. Some men were sleeping, others looked flushed.

Stackhouse was a youngish looking fellow, small of stature and as blonde as they came. Sheppard, keeping his voice strong like a Colonel's asked "How are you doing?"

Stackhouse, who was looking better than most, acknowledged his commander with a small nod of his head, a sort of fingerless salute. "Fine, sir. Feeling better all the time."

"Good, that's good. Listen, Lieutenant, Doctor Beckett tells me he needs to do a biopsy to figure out what this is, so he needs a patient who feels up to it. This is _voluntary_ only, so you don't-"

"No problem, sir. I'll do it."

Sheppard stopped mid-sentence, resisting the urge to pat his stoic young soldier on the back. What outstanding men he had under him. "We really appreciate it, Paul, and we wouldn't ask but any help we can give the doc'..."

"Then let's do it, Colonel, I'm sick of this damn bed and the food sucks."

Sheppard smiled. He nodded, making sure his approval of the young man was clear on his features. "Thanks, Lieutenant, I'll tell the doc' the good news."

XXX

Beckett knocked on Sheppard's office door and entered once the door swung wide on Sheppard's mental command.

He sat opposite him at the desk. There were no files in his hand. "We're going to need to do an abdominal exploratory on Stackhouse or one of the other men."

"What about the biopsy?"

"Done, but the results are telling me something that quite frankly I can't accept, not without seeing for myself."

"Seeing what?"

"It's simpler if I just do the exploratory and absolutely necessary by the way. I'm going to need to do it eventually, but the sooner I can the less invasive it'll be for the patient."

Sheppard could read between the lines. Beckett wasn't beating around the bush on this one. "I'll talk to Stackhouse."

XXX

Several hours later Beckett was back in his office. "You know what this is." Sheppard correctly guessed at Beckett's sober expression.

Beckett nodded. "Yes, I do, and despite the facts I find it hard to believe my own eyes. What's happening to these men is...it's frankly incredible." He rubbed his face and looked at the Colonel, taking a breath. "There is a reproductive change that's taking place inside them, an alteration if you will in their abdominal region, the area just below the transverse intestine." Beckett shook his head. "There appears to be a pouch forming, lined with thick blood vessels linked to the spinal column and the lower part of the stomach._ Lots_ of blood vessels. The interior of the pouches, and these pouches are very small at this stage, are also lined with more tiny blood vessels – many hundreds...and as difficult as this may be to accept, these proto-organs are I believe the equivalent of, um, uteruses."

Sheppard stared as though Beckett had just sprouted a second pair of ears. "Are you saying my men are turning into _women_?"

"No, not exactly, they're still men with all the correct male – er – equipment but they are growing a second set of non-male reproductive organs inside their bodies, not exactly like the human uterus but close enough that the resemblance is unmistakable. The pouch is connected to the anus via a new a specialized duct and there is a smaller organ connected to the bottom of the pouch that would appear to be possibly...a gametes facilitator – an ovary - of some type."

"All of them are showing these changes?"

"Yes."

Sheppard swallowed. "Have you told any of them what's happening to them?"

"Not yet. I haven't been able to figure out a way that won't shock. I don't think there _is_ one though."

Right. Not an easy report to make to a group of toughened men hardened by years in the unforgiving Pegasus galaxy. By the way, the good news is you don't have the flu' but the bad news - you now can be knocked-up. Sheppard stood and walked the length of his desk. "And exactly how does one of these men supposed to _get_ pregnant?" _When did he ever imagine in his earlier career ever needing to ask __**that**__ question? _"Does it work the same way? Does some, does another guy have to, you know...in his...?"

Beckett nodded. "It would appear so."

Sheppard sat down again. "Holy crap." He rubbed his own face. "How in the hell – why in the hell did this happen anyway? Is this some sort of Replicator-engineered joke?" He knew it wasn't. This was something beyond their enemies. As their main food source in the Pegasus galaxy the Wraith wanted humans to breed like bunnies. The Replicators wanted to see them all dead not making babies.

"I was looking for Rodney so I could brainstorm with him; try to find out why this is happening at all although I suspect it has something to do with Atlantis herself. Her computers are the highest order of AI and even Rodney himself has speculated that the city might be to some degree almost sentient. However so far he's not answering his radio."

"But he's only made those speculations when he's drunk or in your infirmary high on pain-killers."

"Never-the-less, I can't think of any other reason this would be happening. This city does work in conjunction with our _genes_ and I certainly am incapable of biologically engineering anything on this scale or complexity, and neither is anyone on Earth. This is an unprecedented alteration of human physiology, physiology that's been developing for millions of years. This kind of evolution does not happen by accident, but evolution_ is_ influenced by the environment and our new environment is without any females at all. Maybe Atlantis sensed that and decided to very rapidly come to the rescue of her resident humans?"

It did make some sense. "Okay, we need to find Rodney."

Rodney answered their door knock and was delighted to crawl from his bed feeling much better.

It was Sheppard and Beckett. "Where've you been?" Sheppard asked as he pushed his way inside.

McKay frowned at both his intruders. "Right here taking a nap."

Beckett nodded. "Sorry for the rude intrusion, Rodney but we need you. Something incredible has happened."

XXX

Rodney walked from the infirmary, leaving Beckett and Sheppard to deal with how to tell nineteen buck-strong males that twenty percent of their nether-regions were now very, very female. His steps were urgent and anyone who passed him in the corridors gave him a wide berth not because of the frown on his face but because they recognised the concentration on his face. It was their chief scientist on a mission to do what they did not know but something obviously very important.

The frown, visible to observers, was none-the-less not directed outward to the current situation in the infirmary, but inward to his body's abdominal soreness now reasserting itself with a vengeance. Beckett had explained symptoms and causes and Rodney had nodded his head and offered his own theory as to why this was happening, one that paralleled Beckett's. This had to be Atlantis herself saving her new assortment of Ancient descendants who called themselves humans. There was simply no other possibility.

So if it was Atlantis doing it, getting away from her might be the cure, and Rodney knew he had little time. His fever had already abated and the soreness, still acute, was fading fast. If he could get away from whatever parts of Atlantis's ancient and largely little-understood energies or AI-activated influence, whatever those were, he might be able to save himself from any further physiological changes.

What other course of action was there? Suddenly his beloved city was now his enemy and escape seemed his only option. The Jumper was just ahead. He had only his laptop, his backpack stuffed with power bars and water, and his radio. Of course they would be calling him, but he would not allow them to find him until he was sure the alterations happening inside his body had been stopped.

This was his hope. He would fly away from Atlantis and out over open water, putting as much distance between himself and the city as possible. All he needed a safe place to hold up for a while. A beach somewhere maybe.

Suddenly the pain doubled him over. Luckily no one was around to observe his sudden groans and the sweat that broke out across his forehead. Seems the pain was not done yet. Rodney tried to straighten up but it proved difficult. Almost stumbling he found a small dark corner, an alcove that at one time no doubt displayed a work of ancient art, but which sole purpose now was collecting dust. However it was narrow and dark and he could hide here away from curious eyes until the spasms passed by as they always did.

XXX

Sheppard heard the call along with everyone on Atlantis. One of Zelenka's life-signs detectors had finally located an unmoving figure, huddled on his side in the dark, sweating and unconscious.

Ronan was the one who reached him first and picked McKay up, ferrying him to the infirmary more swiftly than waiting for the nursing team with their gurney.

Beckett did a quick examination, taking temperature, blood pressure and other vitals and turned to Sheppard, who waited anxiously some steps away from the hurried hands of the nurses who began cutting Rodney's clothing away.

Beckett nodded to Sheppard. "I've mildly sedated him for now but I'm afraid the same thing that is happening to the others is happening to Rodney as well. I'm not sure why this thing has singled out the men it did but part of it might be natural body fat levels and other physiological similarities, things that would facilitate the growth of the pouches and secondary organs in their bodies as opposed to others. Most of these men are on the small side and that could also be part of it. In human evolution, the stronger individuals, most often the males were free to hunt while the smaller ones, the females, were the reproducers of the species but that's just some loose guess work."

Sheppard looked down at the sleeping Rodney. "He knew, didn't he?"

"Yes. He had a bag with him and his laptop. They him found just outside the Jumper Bay. I think his idea was to leave Atlantis. Maybe he thought if he could get away from the city he would be spared the change."

_No such luck_, Sheppard thought. Knowing that it was happening to Stackhouse was bad enough, and his other troops, but now that it was happening to Rodney, all of it against his will, was worse. Sheppard couldn't help but wonder how this was going to affect his friend? Undoubtedly for the worse as Rodney had already been riding the thin edge of a nervous break-down. He pressed his mouth into a thin line, feeling the sheen of sweat across his upper lip. "Let me know when he comes to."

XXX

Part 2 soon.


	2. Chapter 2

**A Habit of Force Part 2**

G.E. Waldo

**WARNING!:** This story is Rodney-mpreg, Rodney/Kolya, Rodney/Ronan-Sheppard-Beckett. Angst, violence. Adult!

**Character death of all females in chapter 1!**

_AUTHOR: *Sick with a cold and about to start a long week of work...sorry this is the only chapter I managed to produce this weekend._

SGASGASGASGASGASGASGA

"He's awake." Was all Beckett said when Sheppard answered his ear bug.

Butterflies set up a waltz in his guts for a reason he could not define, only that he felt his stomach suddenly protest the lunch he had just eaten. Spare food, small portions, rationing had already begun but not because they were yet in dire straits as to food and other supplies, only because it was a good idea. Sheppard felt the need to come up with good ideas now. Elizabeth's forte' – not his. Another necessary adaption to life without her.

Sheppard entered the infirmary and almost turned away at the last second when he saw McKay awake but as white as a sheet, his hand shaking as he stuck a finger in his doctor's face. "I want it cut _out!" _He demanded and Sheppard could hardly blame him for the fear in his eyes.

Beckett, voice soothing and ever kind despite Rodney's attempt to threaten and intimidate - two talents McKay had never excelled at. "I'm afraid that's impossible, Rodney, the blood loss alone-"

"I don't care."

"But I do. This new...condition may seem a bit unsettling but the organs are not interfering with anything and I for one will not perform unnecessary surgery on a patient unless his life is in danger, which yours is not. And at this stage the new tissues can be as easily ignored as your appendix."

McKay finally spotted Sheppard lurking in the doorway. "Good glad you're here, you tell Carson I want this alien stuff removed, Colonel."

_Colonel_, not John, not even Sheppard. "Afraid I can't, Rodney. Beckett has final say in the medical department."

"I call bullshit." Rodney made an attempt to throw back his covers and kick his feet off the bed but his knees were still immobile due to Beckett's safety straps.

Beckett tried to calm him with his reasonable doctor-invented words about giving-it-time and soon-you'll-get-used-to-it but McKay was having none of that and reached down to undo them, fumbling and pulling fiercely at the buckles. "Get these off me, get them off!"

Sheppard moved to the bed in two hurried steps as Beckett reached for a syringe flashing him a look that said Rodney was about to be succumb to a fit of hysteria.

Beckett wasn't far off as Rodney reached out and slapped his hand away sending the syringe flying where it hit the wall and then rattled across the floor, coming to rest by Beckett's upright drug storage cooler. "Rodney..._Rodney!"_ Beckett tried to grab McKay's arms but although the scientist was no strong man he could still best the doctor on a wrestling match and he had Carson's wrists gripped in his thick fingers until Sheppard managed to one hand at a time get his fingers under Rodney's white clenched ones and force his hands away.

"Rodney!" Sheppard finally yelled at his freaking-out friend. "Stop it right now. This isn't Beckett's fault."

McKay collapsed bonelessly back on the bed, the short struggle having taxed every reserve his few days in the infirmary had built up. He closed his eyes and then opened them again, staring at Sheppard with pupils as tiny as pinpoints, the whites rimmed by red and the whole effect undercoated with the baggy grey streaks of utter exhaustion. "It's yours. If you had taken me away from Atlantis like I was trying to do in the first place, I might have been spared this." He glanced down at his hated body that had betrayed him. "Now I'm a freak just like the others."

Beckett retrieved the syringe. "You're not a _freak_, Rodney." He insisted angrily. "You and I already discussed why this might be happening; this is the city's way of_ saving_ us, saving us as a species in the Pegasus galaxy."

Rodney's eyes watered. "I don't _care_ about the galaxy." He muttered while Beckett sent the calming drug home through his patient's IV port. As Rodney's eyes fluttered closed he added softly "I don't care about anything anymore."

Trying to rid himself of some of the stress that had built up for the last few minutes, Sheppard walked a few meters from McKay's bedside and said to Beckett quietly. "I guess we shouldn't have expected anything less from Rodney than total hysteria."

Beckett looked at him sharply. "Colonel, Doctor McKay's outburst is not without excuse. You do understand what is happening to these men? They are becoming something other than male and I don't mean something in between genders. Their androgen hormone levels are undiminished, it's just that they now have the ability to carry and give birth to human children - an extraordinary thing, yes but _none_ of it was voluntary." With one hand he gestured to the larger ward near the back of his domain "As you know two of the younger men are on suicide watch. These men are all terrified – some of them are disgusted with themselves, one tried to stick a pocket knife in his abdomen and cut out the offending new organs himself-"

"I know." Sheppard ground out between clenched teeth. He's received that emergency call at four in the AM the previous night. It had been one of the junior kitchen staffers - Adamson. All he'd managed to accomplish for his trouble was bloody sheets and an ugly scar to carry around for the rest of his life.

Beckett sighed, all the fight gone out of him. "Look, Colonel, most of these men _will,_ I believe, come through this with time but some may not. _Rodney_ may not." Beckett looked back at his sleeping patient and friend. "I know it's hard to believe that a few ounces of tissue in his belly could send him into pits of terror when the Wraith or the Replicators could not, but there it is. He has no control over this at all, this is not like the Wraith, it's not happening to all of us, it's happening to _him_. He can't see the enemy or even do anything to fight it. He's helpless. Just like they all are."

"What _about_ surgery?" If there was a good chance...

Beckett shook his head. "The problem is the tissue is surrounded by the blood vessels that formed first. These vessels extend from the body's main artery right where it splits just above the pelvis, and there are a _lot_ of new blood vessels. I don't have the grafts to repair such a complicated junction – no one does. The risk of them bleeding out or the blood being cut off from the legs is high, he could end up a paraplegic at best or at worst die on the operating table. The tissue itself however is interfering with nothing."

Beckett felt the helplessness of his chosen profession when confronted with a thing that could not be altered with medication or cured by surgery, remarkably it was not a sensation he felt all that often even in the Pegasus galaxy. "He's experiencing no pain, at least none associated with the new organs, so the reason Rodney wants it removed simply springs from its existence." Beckett rubbed tired eyes. "All that's really wrong with him other than his exhaustion is, well...he's afraid."

"How long will he be in here do you think? When will he or any of them be fit to return to duty?"

"That's entirely up to them this time, Colonel."

XXX

Rodney curled up on his own bed. Beckett's orders: freedom from the infirmary and his doctor's ever spying eyes but not free to return to duty for another two days where he was supposed to do "rest and more rest".

Easy. Going back to the lab was about the last place he wanted to be. In his rooms cocooned away from the humiliating looks of sympathy in his work mates' eyes whenever they looked his way – greatly preferable. The door buzzed.

Everyone but Sheppard. It was the third time in two days the man had dropped in. "Door's open." Rodney said listlessly, knowing Sheppard had a mental key to every door in the city whenever he wanted to use it. He only used it here when he figured his friend was being stubborn so there was no use trying to deny the man entry. He felt a creature made of foreign parts and his muscles were like gelatin so he did not bother to rise when Sheppard strolled into the room like Rodney had been expecting him.

"Just wanted to ask if you're sure you're feeling up to going back out tomorrow."

Field work. Planet-side...some planet or other that had also succumbed to the plague that had taken the women in Atlantis and pretty well every world they had visited when the then unrealised virus was just sprouting its wings and infecting every female they came in contact with, starting with Lorne's team on a routine mission to Athos. He nodded, his cheek rubbing the pillow. "Sure. Clean bill of health Beckett says."

"And what about Elmyer?"

The new psychologist who had come to replace...whatever her name had been. "You mean have I had my weekly psych evaluation? Yes." "_You'll get used to the new changes. Give yourself time to adjust. Rome wasn't built in a day."_ Christ, he'd felt like belting the guy. _PhD my ass!_

"Feel like taking a walk?"

Rodney sat up, feeling a slight wave of dizziness overcome him. Low blood pressure doc' had said – a first for him. Sheppard looked hopeful and McKay suddenly felt sorry for him. He'd been kicked down a lot himself lately but Sheppard had been too and he had the weight of the welfare of an entire city of hurting people on his back. Everyone had some "adjusting" to do, may as well join the rest of the oh-so-fucked-up. Besides sitting in his room had gotten old by day two. "Why not?"

XXX

Sheppard bit into the mound of mashed stuff that was supposed to be the equivalent to potatoes but which taste resembled more cauliflower than anything else. He didn't mind. Snippets of conversation at the table drifted to his ears. Some of the men had taken notice of those Atlantis had altered and there had been talk of what to do about keeping Atlantis, and the Pegasus galaxy herself, populated. Sheppard imagined it was only time before some of the men, many of them beginning to feel the pangs of loneliness without the women, began to pair up and a pregnancy or two surprised them all. Atlantis's first male giving birth was imminent.

Rodney nibbled at his meal, unusual for him, but his appetite had been weak since being cleared for full duty. Sheppard, out of habit now, kept one eye on his friend. The mission tomorrow would test whether the scientist was ready psychologically to handle himself.

It would be a simple mission, a recon' to Callistyod, a planet where it was rumored some females had survived the virus. They would be in full hazard suits of course to prevent any infection of said women as the team members were probably all carriers of the sickness. The agenda: check for women and of course any male natives, and check for food to supplement those stocks which Earth had been sending through each week. SGC was becoming more and more nervous about opening the Stargate to Atlantis at all. If even a single cell of the virus got through from Pegasus to home...

Sheppard noted there was another person keeping his eye on Rodney as well. Pelloski was a good man from Lorne's team. A tall strapping fellow with a short dark buzz of hair and a five o'clock shadow by noon, he had been unchanged. Of late he had been turning his eyes sideways during lunch to watch McKay, his scrutiny more and more curious. Sheppard could guess why.

Pelloski slurped from his glass noisily and then, licking his lips "So McKay..." he said it softly but Sheppard and a few others were close enough to hear. "Anyone show an interest yet?"

Rodney stopped picking at his food and looked up with a frown. Pelloski had never initiated a conversation with him before and it was obvious Rodney had not heard the man correctly. "What?"

Pelloski leaned in closer. "Anyone stoke that cushy ass yet?"

Fraternization between the troops had always been officially discouraged but within degrees unofficially tolerated, and sexual innuendo and joking was par for the course in any unit. Sheppard kept his mouth shut. If Rodney was going to survive this new wrench in his life he was going to have to learn to take a few jokes and perhaps even stave off any sexual advances that might start coming his way.

McKay blushed to the roots of his receding hairline. "Go stroke your gun in private _Private_." Rodney said underlining Pelloski's lack of rank. As insults went, it hit the right spot when Pelloski's face soured from a blatant leer into a mask of barely controlled anger. Pelloski's own sexual designs on McKay had now been made evident but the rather average brained Private wasn't quite stupid enough to lash out at the man he saw as Sheppard's pet genius when his commanding officer was sitting three chairs down.

Ronan, seated across the table glared at Pelloski but the private had learned early on that Ronan, at least when he wasn't on duty, was more bark than bite. Besides it was well known the Satedan preferred to let his colleagues settle their own differences.

Pelloski had not made it passed his current rank, mostly for small-time insubordination and fighting within the ranks. Sheppard decided that he had clearly made the right call in rejecting the soldier's applications for advancement.

Pelloski tossed back the rest of his water and shoved his chair back. Managing a curt nod to his commander, he left the table. Unfortunately all eyes were now switched between Sheppard and McKay who was pointedly not looking at anyone. Sheppard decided that Rodney had handled it well and there was no need to discipline Pelloski or say a word about it to Rodney. He wondered though if what just happened was a sign of things to come. If Atlantis had altered some of the men, what might it have done to those it had not altered? Genes controlled human DNA. Atlantis had influence - some _serious_ goddamn influence - over their genes as was now painfully clear by the nineteen or so males in Atlantis who could not only get pregnant but give birth much like their deceased sisters.

Sheppard had heard a few reports here and there by some of the already aggressive alpha males becoming even more aggressive toward the altered men. A few clashes had popped up here and there, mostly put down by his various team members who happened by. It was clear there was a need to post guards or patrols around Atlantis to discourage what were turning out to be some uncomfortable encounters among the two types. He would discuss it with Ronan.

Sheppard called Ronan to his office once lunch was finished. In no uncertain words "Some of the Altered" – it had been Beckett who had coined it – "are being sexually harassed by the other men. We need to post safety patrols."

Ronan sat down. "I'm thinking four patrols of two. Gesser, Marson, Klass, Hodgson..."

Ronan had obviously been considering candidates himself. Sheppard reminded himself how thankful he was to have Ronan on his team and in Atlantis. As strategic men, they often finished each other's thoughts. "And Jones, McLaughlin, Durant and..." Sheppard scratched his chin whiskers. He had about run out of the most trained soldiers who had proved they could really keep their heads in a crisis.

"And me." Ronan said and then when Sheppard gave him a questioning look, he added "I don't have Teyla to spar with anymore and I need to keep sharp."

Of course, made sense. Ronan was probably missing the skilled fighting techniques of their late Athosian teammate. Sheppard nodded. Having Ronan keeping his eye on McKay especially would give his mind a little ease and it seemed Ronan then read his mind again. "I'll take Sciences."

Sheppard was grateful. If anyone could keep Rodney safe, it was Ronan.

XXX

Remarkably there were no further clashes between the Altereds and the rest of the men. In fact, Beckett came to him with a private report just a few weeks later. "I have a patient in the infirmary." He handed the short print-out to Sheppard. "It's Reginald Terry –Reggie - a lad from Environmental Studies in the Sciences Department. He's pregnant and, of course, terrified."

Beckett sat down in one of the three chairs lined up in front of Sheppard's desk. "I have a feeling we'll be seeing more pregnancies before we know it. Seems the lads are starting to pair off."

_Or at least give in to their frisky urges_ Sheppard thought. But there were problems inherent in there being only nineteen Atlereds and over a hundred normal males. The problem was not lost on Beckett though. "I'm not sure what sort of problems this may sprout. There are only a few Altereds and naturally the men are beginning to miss the women."

Miss having them in their beds. Sheppard got it. But a group of mostly ripe, nubile young men don't make a bad substitute, especially since the population of Atlantis as a whole now understood the implications of what having the Altereds around meant. It meant it was still possible to replace the population of Atlantis. There was now no dying out of humans in the city or possibly in Pegasus if this altered business was happening elsewhere. But there were only nineteen of the Altered including one anti-social, very pissed-off scientist who Sheppard guessed was never going to let anyone get near him with a ten foot dildo.

And how, he wondered, did the Altereds feel about the missing women? Did they, at least the ones who were, or _had_ been, heterosexual, miss hetero sex themselves like the others, or was their neuro-physical whatchamacallits now rewired to seek out normal males? Sheppard could not quite get his head around any of it. Was everyone destined to be kind-of-but-not-in-fact gay now? "We might soon need a reminder of some..._social_ rules – who is the father by the way?"

"Reggie won't say. He's embarrassed."

"Great. Well we need to know. Not one of the Altereds" – it was becoming easier and easier to say the word, almost natural now – "is going to be left holding the bag or the baby by himself. The dad's going to pull his load or face discipline." The best thing, Sheppard thought, would have been for the dad to withhold his "load" in the first place and how long would it be before Atlantis was going to need a fulltime daycare complete with staff, diapers and building blocks?

XXX

"Two more confirmed pregnancies." Beckett announced at the next staff meeting. Rodney looked up sharply from his I-pad at the doctor but declined any comment. Some heads automatically swivelled to look at him, the question plainly on their faces. Was their resident Altered scientist himself getting any and would they soon hear the words "Doctor McKay" and "baby bump" in the same sentence?

McKay just scowled back at all of them and Sheppard addressed Beckett's announcement. "I've emailed all the department heads a list of the already established rules that apply to every person in Atlantis about responsible...partnerships and parenting. Before this gets out of hand we need to remind everyone what's expected of them. This may be the Pegasus galaxy and this situation may be...a little unusual but the same laws that apply on Earth are going to apply here as to the care and raising of any children that may result from a union of...well you all know what, and those rules will apply to-" he had almost said mother and father but after a few seconds decided on the more accurate "-_both_ fathers."

That said he decided to move on with another mission since the first one had brought them to a relatively empty desert planet with no natives and no easily obtainable food sources. It had been a bleak proposition to begin with. But some Intel left over from Elizabeth's days had come across his desk via Chuck and this seemed like better prospects. "MVX-676 was reported to have abundant grains and fruit trees, all wild. A mission had been planned but then the virus came and...anyway I'll be taking team One with four extra hands and making the trip via the Drive-Jumper so we can bring back more of whatever we find than we can carry. We leave at oh-eight-hundred tomorrow. Lorne will be in charge while we're gone. Any questions?"

There appeared to be none as people began gathering up their notes or I-pads. "Doctor McKay." Rodney did not retake his seat but waited until everyone else had filed out. Sheppard closed the door after them.

"Something on your mind Colonel?" Rodney seemed anxious to vacate the office. Sheppard recognised the telltale anxiety in the scientist by the stiffness of his shoulders and the tilt of his head, as though he was willing to listen but only with one ear and half a mind.

"Yeah, Rodney, I was wondering how you are?" they hardly spoke like friends anymore and Sheppard wanted to repair that as soon as possible.

"Right as rain. Anything else?"

Sheppard sighed and sat down again, regarding his most stubborn friend. "Is Pelloski leaving you alone?"

"Yes, ever since you sic-ed Ronan on him, and I don't need a baby-sitter by the way."

"That wasn't my intention but there have been a few isolated incidents of Altereds being sexually interfered with and I want to prevent any more, especially with Atlantis's lead scientist. Some of the Normals are having difficulty controlling their..._drives_. We have to nip that in the bud."

McKay's face darkened. "Don't call me that."

Sheppard shook his head, a bit confused. "Call you what?"

""_Altered"._ And I'm just as _normal_ as you are. I didn't undergo a sex change in case you've forgotten, these..._organs_..." he spit out the word with contempt "were not my doing and if I had my choice I'd have them ripped out of me."

"I know that." Sheppard's softened his words but not too much. If McKay felt Sheppard was showing him the slightest hint of pity McKay would fire bomb him with words and storm out of the room. Becoming a marginally effeminated Altered hadn't softened McKay's temper one little bit. "And the word is not intended as an insult you know, Rodney, it's just a word."

Rodney seemed to relax a little and then said in a small voice. "I know." He finally looked at Sheppard for the first time since their little interview had begun. "You just...you have no idea how...this is just so..." then he swallowed and straightened his shoulders, lifting his chin in defiance of ever revealing how he really felt about all of it. The closed-off McKay was back. "May I go now Colonel?" He asked wearily.

Sheppard nodded, able to fill in Rodney's unspoken word himself. When his silently suffering friend had left closing the door behind him Sheppard said the word aloud - "_humiliating_."

XXX

Ronan's presence in the halls and corridors near the Science Department's laboratories was a constant irritant as far as McKay was concerned and it took every move he could think of to lose the guy on his way to the upper levels of Atlantis. He was hungering for some alone time which he had not had the freedom to enjoy since King Sheppard's new edict about the Altereds being protected from the drooling advances of the Normals via patrols of, ironically enough, beefy Normals supposedly out to ensure their virtue.

Ronan's steady hunter's eyes on his back whenever he wasn't looking were one such unwelcomed reminder of that edict. Humiliating didn't even begin to cover it.

He still had his active ear bug and idly listened to the goings on inside Atlantis while he took a moment to breathe free from watching eyes. Here he could relax and look out over the moving water. Now that was freedom and power. The almost living motion of the waves against the thick outer walls of Atlantis was hypnotic and lulled his troubled mind into deeper, more calming halls of thought.

So lost was he in the undulating blue sheet of ocean he did not even hear the person behind him until that person spoke. "Come here often sailor?"

McKay jumped and turned finding himself almost nose to nose with Pelloski. Great.

"Kiss off Private." He sounded braver than he felt knowing he was alone with the much larger man who had made no secret of his designs on certain parts of his very private anatomy.

Pelloski didn't budge in fact he took one small step closer, his belly now almost touching McKay's. "And if I don't?" He asked, and then before Rodney could avoid the gesture, the bigger man ran a finger down Rodney's cheek, licking his lips obscenely. "What are you going to do about it McKay? Squeal for help? Cry for your daddy Sheppard? Don't try and tell me that our self-righteous Colonel isn't already doing you hard every night of the week. With an ass that fine, I bet he didn't manage to resist firing off his missiles for more than a day." Pelloski smiled cruelly. "I can imagine. I'll bet you're hot and tight and once you've been made all..._ready_ you probably begged him for it."

"Fuck off Pelloski. I'm not into micro-brains, or micro dicks for that matter." Rodney said trying to take a step away but finding himself backed up against the concrete marble of the balcony.

Pelloski's manner changed abruptly and he lunged for the scientist but some of Ronan's lessons in self defense had paid off and McKay sidestepped the man, blocking his other grasping arm with a solid punch to his jaw. Pelloski wiped the blood from his lips and looked up at McKay with a satisfied grin, like it was a game. "Not bad McKay, not bad. But you know you're no match for me. Give in now and I'll make this quick. You might even enjoy it."

"Is that what you used to tell _all_ your girlfriends?"

Before he could make a dash for the door Pelloski grabbed both of Rodney's wrists his thick fingers biting into the flesh and bone until Rodney could not help the whimper that escaped his lips. It would take very little extra pressure to snap his wrist bones and Pelloski grinned as he pushed Rodney to the rough deck of the balcony. "There, baby, hush now and I won't hurt you anymore."

As Rodney fought and jerked his body, trying to buck the man off Pelloski's rude hands tore at his pants until the top button popped off. He then unzipped them in one smooth motion. Placing Rodney's pinched and painful wrists beneath one powerful hand and using his greater bulk, Pelloski held him down as he forced Rodney's pants down off his hips, one handed-ly pushing them inch by inch until they were bunched up below his knees.

Fumbling at his own crotch, Pelloski freed his already hard and leaking cock. It bobbed in the cool air and the man's movements became more frantic as his lust took control of him. Giving McKay a few seconds to see his throbbing erection, Pelloski then drew back his free hand into a fist and struck Rodney on the side of his head once and then twice. A third time sent McKay into a half conscious daze and Pelloski used that moment to flip the scientist on his stomach.

Pelloski bit his lip and fondled the perfectly round, firm ass beneath his exploring hands. "Micro dick huh? You know McKay, that's one delicious ass you got there. Perfectly lovely in fact. As _fuckable_ as they come."

With McKay now unconscious Pelloski worked up some spit in his mouth and smeared it over his cock, mixing it with the blob of pre-cum clinging to the massive mushroom shaped tip. "Oh yeah...sweet McKay ass. You're gonna' be a real_ treat_." He whispered into the left ear of his now senseless victim, lining up the head of his penis with Rodney's untouched and unprepared anus. "Micro cock huh?" Pelloski whispered cruelly and then plunged his member home in one stroke as deep as it would go. "Let's see what you think of my cock once I'm done reamin' and creamin'."

Pelloski's grunts were the only noise in his ears until the sound of heavy running boots interrupted his forced ministrations upon Rodney's body and just as the doctor was coming around large hands seized the back of his military issue shirt and yanked him off his feet, pulling him and his offending prick off his rape victim.

Ronan Dex had him in the iron grip of his right fist and the Private was literally dangling free, his feet swinging helplessly, his pants and boxers down around his knees. Pelloski found himself nose to nose with the royally pissed off Satedan who was fingering his lethal home-grown weapon in the other hand, its thick muzzle pressed against the side of his skull. "Maybe you didn't get the Colonel's memo but Altereds are supposed to be left alone unless they _choose_ consent or don't you know how to read you ignorant rapist fuck?"

"Ronan." It was Sheppard's voice from behind him. "Put him down and let these men handle it from here. Stick him in the brig on half rations."

Ronan dropped the offending rapist like he was a bag of garbage and spun on Sheppard "Half rations? He was _raping_ McKay. We all saw it. He should be killed right now."

Sheppard looked to where Beckett's nurses were loading the still half conscious McKay onto a stretcher, swiftly covering his nakedness with a sheet the colour of hospital blue. "Yeah well summary executions aren't the way it's done in Atlantis. Look I know how you feel but we'll deal with Pelloski later. Right now Rodney needs the attention."

Sheppard watched them carry Rodney away while Ronan following closely behind as though the Satedan was expecting another assaulting asshole to pop out of the wood work any minute. Sheppard ran a hand down his face. A rape in Atlantis. The collective hormones in the men, in the Normals, had to be raging to result in such a loss of control in a man who, despite possessing almost as big a mouth as McKay, had always maintained an even head in combat. _"Fuck!"_

XXX

Part 3 asap


	3. Chapter 3

**A Habit of Force Part 3**

G.E. Waldo

**WARNING!: -** This story is Rodney-mpreg, Rodney/Kolya, Rodney/Ronan-Sheppard-Beckett. Angst, violence. Adult! (Character death of all females in chapter 1!)

*_My cold turned into throat/bronchial/double ear infections. Sick as a dog for ten days, and that is why this is late. Sorry folks! (still ill but feeling better)._

SGASGASGASGASGASGASGASGASGASGASGA

"He is not pregnant." was Beckett's quietly word report three days later to Sheppard. "Pelloski succeeded in...penetration but he was interrupted early enough that there was no ejaculation - ergo no pregnancy."

Sheppard forced his ears to hear it, no matter how insane it seemed to be to listen to Beckett describe such things about McKay, or any man, and about Pelloski's attempted rape. "Okay, that's something at least." Though not much. "So how is he?"

Beckett's eyebrows climbed his forehead. "How would _you_ be Colonel? Rodney is angry, frustrated and humiliated for starters. But I imagine you want to see him?"

The truth was a no but his lips contradicted him anyway. And there was work to be done. Work that he wanted Rodney in on. "Yeah. Got a mission tomorrow and we need him." How the hell was he supposed to protect these men? He had posted guards in and around the city but still Normals and Altereds were finding ways to sneak off together, while others seemed content to let their thwarted hormones known publically, the cat-calls and copping-of-feels had become common-place in the mess and in the corridors. How did you patrol people's loins or lust?

"A mission?" Beckett looked shocked. "Look, Rodney may be fine physically, there was no tearing I am surprised to say, but mentally-"

"A mission is what he needs. He feels helpless." Sheppard insisted.

"Since when did you become the city psychologist?" Beckett asked, his color rising. "Rodney isn't like you or me anymore, Colonel, he's-"

"He's still McKay." Sheppard said between gritted teeth. "He's still Atlantis's Science Department Head and we need our best in the field. Is he _physically_ fit to go off-world or not?"

"This is nuts Colonel. He was just attacked."

"And you said he was physically okay, so I'll take that as a yes. Psychologically...he'll just have to figure it out as he goes along." Sheppard had to believe that was true. That's what they all did after all; they figured the hard things out as they happened. It was what you did in Pegasus because this galaxy didn't slow for invalids or suffer the little children of The Milky Way. It threw shit at you and you either got with the program or you...

Or usually you died.

"We're going. He's coming." Beckett saw it was their leader's last word on the matter and took up his pen, scribbled his signature on McKay's medical release and shoved the clipboard into Sheppard's outstretched hand. "This is on you, Colonel. Rodney may be physically fine but this is still against my medical advice which I will duly note in my log."

To be read or critiqued by whom? Sheppard thought. "Duly noted."

Already some of the Altereds had adjusted to their new state and, as some saw it, social status and seemed content to pair off with this or that Normal. Five pregnancies were already obvious among them and Sheppard had no doubt that more would pop up soon enough. But some Altereds hated their new physical reality and were deep in session with either the resident psychologist or drowning their sorrows in drink or leaning heavily upon some other chemical crutch. Two were still on suicide watch. Some were barely coping and some not at all.

Some like Rodney. But Rodney - messed up or not - didn't need sessions with the local head-shrinker or someone to hold his hand. Rodney was stronger than that. He needed his normal routine. He needed work.

"Hey Rod'." Sheppard had aimed hard to speak the nick-name casually but instead it came out as tight as a guitar string. Sheppard winced, hoping McKay didn't notice. But the scientist, dressed in a hospital typical ugly gown, was hunkered down in the infirmary bed with his depression wrapped around him like a winter cloak.

"Colonel..." Still not _John_ or _Sheppard_.

"Feeling up to a mission?"

Surprisingly Rodney lifted his head off the cotton covered plastic pillow. "For...?"

"We need some supplies. The bad news is the ZPM is on reduced power until Zelenka can complete some maintenance so it's the LT drive Jumper for this one. Good news is it's a planet we've been to before. No Wraith because the planet's been culled to the proverbial bone, so no nasty natives or our persons being fired upon etcetera."

"Sounds dull."

"That part is, true, b-u-u-t it is also a planet that had some ancient tech' we couldn't retrieve the last time because back then there _were_ Wraith and nasty natives and such. Feel up to some treasure hunting?"

McKay sat up letting the sheets fall away. With two fingers and a wince he peeled the small bandage from the side of his forehead. Three stitches were revealed where Pelloski had opened his skin with a solid strike of his fist; where his ring had cut into the taut flesh. Sheppard recalled how much it had bled. Head wounds always did.

Sheppard bit his lip, gesturing to the still angry-red wound. "Are you sure you should-?"

"Doc' said I didn't have a concussion," Rodney explained in short fast words. It was unlike him. "Pelloski just rattled my brain a bit. I'm fine. Besides I welcome any excuse to get out from under Doctor Do-Good." Actually a mission via a Jumper would last two, maybe three days. Three glorious days away from Atlantis and the lingering eyes of the Normals under which he felt suffocated. Being back with the team, working, tinkering with some new ancient tech'. Many glorious hours away from the city that had betrayed him. He used to love her.

Sheppard frowned. "You know, Carson _is_ just trying to help."

"I don't need help." He jumped off the bed and practically tore the thin blue hospital gown from his body, letting it fall to the floor in a small heap. "I just need to get out of here."

Sheppard noted that McKay was nude beneath the gown, his usual modesty seemingly forgotten in his anxiety to escape Beckett's needles and soulful eyes. "Where are my clothes?"

Feeling his heart rate spike at his friend's - at his _Altered_ friend's nakedness Sheppard quickly averted his eyes. "Umm, maybe in the closet?" He pointed at a line of four small storage cabinets off to one side of the four main ward beds. Rodney found what he was looking for. No underwear appeared but he fished around and came up with a pair of loose, faded jeans with tears in both knees and a much washed t-shirt, the sky-blue color having been bleached out to a mottled grey long ago.

Sheppard swallowed thickly at seeing Rodney slip well proportioned legs into the jeans, commando-style, and then pull the t-shirt over his torso, his body having leaned up a bit in the previous weeks. The t-shirt had over the years worn thin in different places and every tantalizing dip and swell on the man's muscled chest was visible, the nipples standing erect from the cool tile of the medical bay beneath their feet. Sheppard guessed the man's substantial appetite had been curtailed in all the stress inherent in the changes to his body. Rodney looked good. Sheppard swallowed again. He looked really, _really_ good.

"Ready?" It had escaped as an almost squeak but Rodney wasn't paying attention, slipping his feet into flat, lace-less runners with no socks.

Sheppard led his companion from the infirmary, trying not to think of all the naked skin beneath Rodney's no underwear and no socks. "Come on, you can hit the showers before the pre-mission briefing. One hour." Sheppard was glad he was facing away from Rodney while he slowly sucked and then blew a few calming breaths to control his racing heart, needing to escape into a cold shower himself as soon as possible. He hoped no one along the way noticed the growing tent in his pants.

Sheppard let the spray wash over him and tried not to think about Rodney showering two stalls over, or imagining the soap bubbles forming and clinging to his muscles, the water dripping off his biceps, trickling down his thighs and draining along the crack of his nicely padded ass. Sheppard fisted his cock but resisted jacking off lest he make some very obvious noises while he envisioned Rodney beneath him, looking up at him with blue eyes half lidded, his legs bent double and slung over Sheppard's shoulders, his hole open and waiting. Rodney wanting, aching for it_ – pleading for_ the colonel's slick penis like a parched land begs for the hot rays of its sun, the scientist raking his hands over Sheppard's rippling back muscles, his lips parted and panting, his insides deliciously clenching around Sheppard's cock and holding fast, growls and moans erupting from both their throats.

Sheppard _refused_ to imagine the ecstasy they were giving to each other and the unbelievable sexual drives within him that made him pump his ever thickening cock into Rodney's body, slowly at first and then faster and faster, his entire body screaming with the lust of possession until he was driving his cock into his sexually, sweetly altered friend and there was finally no thought but sex and love and owning Rodney's body and fucking him every night, all night long for all time, until Sheppard lost control of his own mind and his thoughts scattered to the ether.

Then his very body lost all feeling but for the sensations of sex and power and wanting and lusting for and _loving_ the man beneath him while he thrust and thrust again, so hard and so fast and so incredible the endless moment that he knew he could stand it no more. He would die but for only to have this and nothing else. He pumped and moaned and then the universe itself disappeared and there was no life or breathe but his hard body screaming its lust and Rodney's perfect flesh around him succumbing completely. While the water poured, unseen and unfelt, and the spray turned cold, Sheppard relentlessly fucked his best friend over and over and over...

Until he _burst_!

Sheppard opened his eyes and looked down, realising he had just come all over his hand, his cock still twitching under his trembling fingers. He took a deep breath, rinsed off and stepped from the stall, hoping like hell he had made no outcry – he honestly had no idea whether he had or not.

But Rodney was still under the spray and appeared not to have heard him.

"_Colonel Sheppard."_ It was Beckett over the city's main comm..

He found his ear bug among his discarded clothes and, sticking it over his ear, with a single tap turned it on with shaking fingers. "Sheppard h-here."

"_The chemists have discovered something interesting I thought you might like to know." _

"What?"

"_It's better if you come to the Infirmary."_

"More bad news?"

"_Not exactly."_

He had just enough time before the pre-mission briefing. "I'll be right there."

"So what couldn't wait?" Sheppard asked the doctor.

Beckett met him just outside the small ward. "Well, it's not that it_ couldn't_ wait but you're about to spend significantly more time with Rodney than usual and I thought-"

"The short version if you don't mind, doc'."

Beckett pressed his lips together, still annoyed at his leader for contravening his medical opinion about McKay. "Fine. Seems the chemicals in the Altereds bodies are having an interesting effect on the Normals."

Fisting his hands to stop them trembling at the mere mention of the word that now described twenty percent of Atlantis's population, including Rodney, Sheppard asked "Interesting how?"

"Well, it's not something that can be _directly_ observed – we don't live in a Petri dish but the nature of the hormones the Altereds are producing now are most likely having an influence over the Normal's –er – drives."

"Drives?" Sheppard thought he could guess but he asked anyway. "You mean sexual drives?"

"Em-yes. It would seem Atlantis wants the Normals, however reluctant some of them may be to - *ahem* - _mate_ with an altered, to be _attracted_ to the Altereds whether they want to be or not. This would account for the sudden pairing off we've seen and the subsequent pregnancies."

"So the more time a Normal spends with an Altered...?"

"Quite right I'm afraid," Beckett confirmed. "The more likely it is that the Normal will be drawn to that particular Altered. I just thought I ought to warn you... "

Sheppard nodded his thanks. "I appreciate it doc'. Ronan and I'll be...careful." He wondered if Beckett was suffering the same other-than-usual _drive_.

Making his way back to his office in time for the briefing, Sheppard rubbed the fingers of his right hand across tired eyes. "_Now_ he tells me."

The briefing was short and sweet and after it concluded each member went their way for the remainder of the working hours, Rodney, now dressed in proper Science department colours, making an abrupt left turn in the direction of his labs. The newest member of the team, Evan Lorne, bumped up from Team 2, was a well disciplined soldier and a medic to boot. The younger man nodded his head to his colonel and slipped out the door. Best of all, Lorne was a tried and true member of Atlantis's off-world teams and the best possible choice to replace Teyla. For one thing he got along with most anybody and Sheppard figured it was about time they had a properly trained medic to accompany them on their frequently dangerous off-world sojourns.

"Ronan, would you hang back a minute?"

The tall Satedan simply stood with his arms crossed, waiting. To the eyes of strangers it might appear an insolent stance to present to one's commander but Sheppard recognised it as a typical Ronan mannerism. He had no doubt Ronan was giving his full attention to every word. His most well trained soldier had never failed to show the proper respect, even if the man was a bit verbally retentive.

"Um, I wanted to ask you something." Sheppard rubbed at his chin whiskers. "You've been spending a lot of time around the labs and around Rodney –right?"

"Yeah," Ronan answered then added his own question "This about the rape?"

Sheppard did a double-take. "Er – no, no, it's not about that."

"'Cause I screwed up. It was my fault. I let Rodney get away from me."

Sheppard wasn't all that surprised that the scientist had managed it. Ronan may have been faster on his feet but Rodney could out-think anyone when it came to a disappearing act. All the scientist had done was reprogram one of the transporters on the fly and sent Ronan somewhere other than his destination in mind and – whoosh – no Ronan guard dog.

Ronan was still trying to live down the failure. The Satedan had been blaming himself ever since the attack on McKay and no amount of soothing words had allayed his self-disappointment, but Sheppard could hardly fault the man for taking his duties so much to heart.

"Look, it sucks that Rodney was attacked but it was partly his own fault." Though it was mostly Pelloski's – who had been stripped of his rank and tossed in Atlantis's only make-shift cell for however long seemed appropriate. Sheppard still didn't know for sure how long that should be. He'd been too busy to arrange any sort of military hearing as yet. Still he didn't mind too much that Pelloski had to sit on his ass for a while and eat the half ration slops the kitchen staff deigned to give him. It served the rapist asshole right to have to worry about his future for a while.

"But, other than when Rodney was attacked, you've spent a lot of time with him and I was just wondering...Beckett told me that some of the Normals are having...certain, uh, physical _reactions_ to the Altereds – to their – um –chemical make-up, you know, the way that make-up is _now_ and-"

"I know about the hormones thing. It happens in a lot of species. R'you asking me if I want to fuck Rodney?"

Sheppard shut his mouth which Ronan's comment had left hanging open. "Er, well not in those terms exactly but, well, yes, I suppose you could put it like that."

Ronan shrugged, not understanding Sheppard's discomfort with any conversation that revolved around sex. All humans had a problem with it, to the species it was like normal sexual functions were some kind of shameful secret, an attitude he had never understood. Humans talked freely of feces, often lacing their humor with it, but sex seemed to leave them flustered and embarrassed. It was puzzling. "Yeah. I've _thought_ about it. Is that a problem?"

Sheppard blinked. "Um, no, no not a _problem_, I just wondered if whether...you might be having a concern with it, you know, on the missions...I mean_ are_ you uncomfortable or does it...?"

"Affect my judgement? – no." Ronan sighed. "Sheppard. I'm not ashamed that I feel drawn to Rodney but I'm not going to do anything about if that's what you're worried about. If Beckett says this is why it's happening, then fine. Doesn't mean I can't control myself."

"Good." Sheppard nodded. "That's good. I mean he's a friend, right? And a team mate. I wasn't worried that you couldn't keep it under wraps – er - I meant to say keep yourself-"

"Are _you _having a problem with it?" Ronan asked. It certainly seemed so to the Satedan. Made sense though; Sheppard and McKay had been close friends for years. "If you're having trouble keeping your penis in line around him, I've got a few ideas."

Ronan was never one to mince words. Bluntness, Sheppard had quickly learned after getting to know the man, was a Satedan trait. "Um, no, no trouble. I'm, fine, just fine - I'm solid." Sheppard smiled reassuringly while feeling his defenses crumble beneath the Satedan's double-barrelled stare.

As Sheppard figured, Ronan saw through him like rice paper. "Look if you're having trouble, just masturbate before the missions. You'll be good for hours."

Sheppard was not used to _this_ level of bluntness from his team mate and rose to his feet, almost jumping out of his chair. "Uh, yeah, sure, great, thanks for the tip. I'll see you in the morning - oh-six-hundred." He ushered Ronan from his office and closed the door.

Collapsing back in his chair he swivelled for a minute just to find some mental balance again and then rubbed his hands over his face. "Masturbate he says." If only it were that easy. Thoughts of Rodney encroached on his every waking moment, ever since the attack. A fierce protectiveness had bubbled up in him, more powerful than anything he'd felt before.

It was nothing new, not really, he had always felt protective toward Rodney and the other members of his team – toward everyone in Atlantis in fact but this new surge of emotion was unlike anything he'd ever experienced. And his physical desire for Rodney was building like the dome in a long dormant volcano, his emotions ready to explode whenever he was near the scientist, the heat in his loins a slow-burning furnace, growing hotter and hotter with each encounter. Worst of all it was beginning to affect his thinking whenever he was around the man, which was inherently dangerous when off-world.

"Shit." Tomorrow was a mission. A simple mission, thank god, with no worry of Wraith or anything threatening. Still, he had to do something about it.

Maybe Beckett had some pills for this kind of thing.

XXX

With the team assembled in the Jumper, consisting of himself, Ronan, McKay, Lorne and two extra hands to assist in gathering up whatever tech' Rodney managed to lay his hands on during their eighteen hour mission on MVX-233, Sheppard piloted the craft out of Lantea II's atmosphere and engaged the Light Drive. With Ronan to his left Sheppard felt slightly more in control of himself, glad that McKay had opted for one of the two rear seats. The two extra hands, both young men, one from the Science department and one from the military contingent, completed the mission's roster.

Sheppard was glad for some time away from the city as well. Chuck had been left in charge, an experienced and capable fellow from McKay's home country.

The flight was going to be six hours of boredom and Sheppard knew the men could keep themselves entertained, and a deck of playing cards soon appeared between the men in the rear of the Jumper. Ronan, usually content to simply stare out the window and let the universe go by, never-the-less responded when Sheppard started one of the word games he had often used to pass the time, one that had the added benefit of teaching Ronan some of the subtler forms of English, a language with which the Satedan still occasionally struggled. "Ronan. Two words; meaning to swindle a credulous person."

Ronan shrugged. "An easy mark?"

"Close," Sheppard said. "To "pluck a pigeon". Your turn."

Ronan thought about it for a second. "To delay coming to a point; to use more words than needed."

Sheppard smiled at the man's back-handed insult to the game itself, and to English. "I know that one - to "beat about the bush"." Sheppard answered. "Okay, it's one-all –go."

From behind him McKay piped up "How about this one: slightly mad in the _head_ and here's the answer - "Bats in the Belfry"."

Without missing a beat Sheppard quipped "How about one who spoils other people's fun by ill humor or excessive seriousness – hey Mister _Wet blanket_?"

"Ha, ha, but as long as we're playing word games - that was very funny Mister Crippled fowl." McKay grumbled and stuck his nose back in his laptop.

Ronan frowned. "Crippled fowl?"

Sheppard chuckled at his sour-puss scientist friend. "Lame duck."

A soft whine was suddenly heard that filled the ship and their ears, growing in volume. The game instantly forgotten, Ronan checked his instruments and saw that Sheppard was doing the same. "What the hell is that?" Sheppard asked. "Rodney?"

Rodney had scrambled to his feet and was pulling away this panel and that, checking control crystals and connections. "I have no idea – yet, one second."

The sound increased, like the whine of a wind shrieking through closed shutters. It was starting to hurt his ear drums but Sheppard grit his teeth and tried to ignore it. "I don't think we have more than second, McKay – talk to me." He had to yell above the din.

Rodney ignored the colonel and unceremoniously shoved a man out of his way to get at a panel at the rear of the Jumper. His attention switching back and forth between the circuits and his laptop he bellowed back "There's nothing wrong. The systems all check out!"

Ronan shook his head at his own instruments that still told him nothing. "It must be external."

"_Can't_ be!" McKay shouted above the din, his tone a certainty. "Nothing can generate this kind of interference in a slip stream. The very nature of a slip stream is its _lack_ of existence in any physical form and therefore it can't contain the sort of interference that would generate an external noise. Nothing but another ship in perfect synchronistic flight. We'd have to be practically joined at the hip."

The Jumper shuddered. "Well your "impossible nothing" is impacting the Jumper's systems, McKay." Sheppard frowned, checking out the possibility. "Still nothing on the scanners. Whatever the hell it is we can't use the shield in the slip stream so we can't block it!"

"You mean we're a sitting duck." Ronan commented.

"Yeah." Sheppard tried his scanners again. "Still nothing. Whatever this is, it's-"

"-It _has_ to be coming from the stream itself." Ronan said.

"I already told you that's impossible!" McKay reminded him.

Sheppard shook his head. "McKay's right. I've never heard of a-"

A flash of white light fell across all of them, causing Sheppard to throw his arms up to protect his eyes. The electric shimmer seemed to have weight and form but after a minute Sheppard realised it was just phantoms playing on the nerves of his skin. "More of the impossible?" He said to an astonished McKay.

Everyone strained to see past the spots in their eyes as the light began to shrink and move around the small ship, as though it were looking for something. In seconds the light shrank and coalesced around Rodney who was still at the rear of the ship and standing apart from the others. The scientist was frozen in place, his eyes wide with fright at the thick bolt of light snaking around him, flashing and pulsing, first touching every part of him with strange finger-like projections and then settling around him like an envelope, a living sheet of blinding light. Sheppard could barely see Rodney through the glare.

Ronan saw that the light, as bright as it was, was beginning to glow even brighter as the horrendous noise itself faded. His instinct told him that something in its nature had changed, and his nerves screamed at him to move now, _right_ _now_, before it was too late.

He had failed Rodney once, he would not do so a second time. "McKay!" He could not say what prompted him to do so, other than his instinct to do _something-anything-but-right-now_ and he yelled, leaping from his seat and flying across the short space between him and the scientist. Flinging his long arms around his team mate, he held on tight.

Ronan turned his eyes to Sheppard and screamed, instinct still running high and fast. He knew what this was and that was instinct as well, but borne along by experience. "If it was going to kill him, it would have already Sheppard. It _has_ to be a ship – a transporter. Find some way to track-"

Then, in the next second, the light disappeared in a flash of cold brilliance, taking McKay and Ronan with it.

XXX

Ronan felt like he'd been run over by a hundred Wraiths. He groaned and managed to roll onto his back, spitting the bits of dirt from his lips and coughing at the dryness in his throat. Sitting up he looked around. "Great."

Dirt floor, bars for walls, bars for a ceiling too. Not two feet to his left Rodney lay on his back unmoving. Ronan reached out a hand and touched the side of his throat. A strong beat. He felt for breathe under the scientist's nose. Good and regular respirations. "McKay? _Rodney_." Not a twitch so not asleep but unconscious.

Footsteps approached and Ronan looked down the single short corridor that stretched out before him. At the end was a thick metal door. That door opened.

A tall man approached, imposing to most but to Ronan just a murderer. An outlaw to his own people, one with no honor or decency. One who sold his brethren for things like power, prestige or station. A man less than an animal. "Kolya." Ronan grunted the name like it was a mistake, as though he had actually meant to belch.

"You're Sheppard's Satedan soldier." Acustus Kolya said with no keen interest.

Ronan snarled "I belong to _no one_!"

"We all like to think that." He said mildly. Kolya scratched a pock-marked cheek. The man was not handsome, but he was striking, with a strong nose that thrust eagerly out into whatever was his kingdom of the week, his form thick and tall, and his manner ruthless through and through. "Time usually teaches us otherwise."

"Go to hell." It was an Earth curse but it seemed appropriate. Besides he had no weapon.

At present.

Neither any means of escape.

Yet.

Kolya smiled indulgently, completely at ease with his command and his power over his prisoners and the curse fell on deaf ears and hearing used to empty threats. "Take the recent troubles in Pegasus,' Kolya spoke as though he were the lecturer and Ronan the student. "We were strong. Over four hundred men and women, all soldiers fighting for our lives, fighting the Wraith, fighting Atlantis for limited resources, but now our colony is suffering the same misfortune that Atlantis has. All of our women are dead or dying. We have no future but for our few men who have become, shall we say, _more than they were_. But we have only four. Four among two hundred and forty-five soldiers. Not nearly enough to sustain our population."

The light had wanted something, it had wanted McKay. Kolya had controlled that light. The man himself was darkness but who disguised himself with light. Irony was thick in Pegasus.

As though reading his thoughts Kolya gestured a lazy hand in Ronan's direction. "Yes, we took McKay - it was no accident, but your presence is, I'm sorry to say, unintentional. We had no desire for you Satedan. However you have your uses. You are strong and you can work in the mines or in the fields."

Kolya stopped his pacing before the cage and stared down at the still unconscious McKay. "But Doctor McKay, he has many uses. Many fine uses."

Ronan could see, even in the guarded eyes of a predator like Kolya, the burning lust within. "Yes," Kolya said his voice softer, if anything on the man could so be called. "I have come to respect Doctor McKay. He is a fighter. And clever, _very_ clever. And, as I swiftly came to learn, he is _more than he was_. He will give us a great deal."

"How did you know?" Ronan asked, trying not to beat his fists at the bars separating him from Kolya and the man's swift death under his squeezing fingers. "How did you know about Atlantis?"

"You think I would abandon such a city without leaving behind spies?"

Rona understood. "Electronic spies." He said. _Bugs_ Sheppard called them. Small un-noticed things. Tiny brains hiding in crawlspaces and cracks, ignored by all as though of no account. It suited. As he had been steadily learning, English was littered with many such colourful terms.

"Of course. We were driven out but then we never _actually_ left." Kolya rested massive hands on a thick belt at his waist. His jacket was decorated with many metal pins. Sheppard was right, the man considered himself a general like Landry was a General. Ronan doubted such acclaims had been earned honorably.

"So all this because you wanted McKay? He's an Altered but he's only one."

"One is enough for now. We will gather others as opportunity presents." Kolya smacked his lips. "Hmm, is that what you call them?" Kolya tried it out on his tongue. "Altereds. A somewhat clinical label for something so precious. We prefer - in our language - _those much sought after;_ _those prised or loved."_

Ronan snorted. "You don't love anything. You don't even know how."

Kolya sniffed at him, and then rested his eyes elsewhere for a moment before turning them back, black pupils idly regarding him as though he were a subject of little further interest. "That is where you are wrong, Ronan Dex of Sateda. I already love your Doctor McKay enough to let you live."

XXX

Part 4 asap.

_Yeah I know - Rodney disappears kinda' like the way he did in "Sometime Somehow" but what the hey... _

_Also in answer to some reader's inquiries I promise this will eventually be a McKay/Sheppard love thing...just have patience dear friends..._


	4. Chapter 4

**A Habit of Force Part 4**

G.E. Waldo

**WARNING!: -** This story is Rodney-mpreg, Rodney/Kolya, Rodney/Ronan-Sheppard-Beckett. Angst, violence. Adult! (Character death of all females in chapter 1!).

SGASGASGASGASGASGASGASGASGA

Shaking the spots from his eyes, Sheppard stared at the place where Ronan and McKay disappeared, then turned his attention back to his consol that was ringing at him in alarm, overriding the ringing in his ears from the wail of the light-beam that had snatched his team members out from under them. "We're out of the slip stream – adrift." He announced. Not real good.

Lorne took McKay's co-pilot seat and checked his instruments. "Engines appear okay. No apparent damage."

That was a relief. "Any sign of another ship, or that energy whatever-the-hell beam?" Sheppard asked.

Lorne shook his head. "I am reading a cloud of subatomic particles, maybe an engine trail. Impossible to track it out here though. But it looks as though both ships dropped out of L-drive before they took McKay and Ronan. No way could they transport someone in the stream, as least as far as we know it's impossible."

"Well, obviously someone has L-Drive other than us."

And they had McKay and Ronan.

"Wraith?" Lorne guessed aloud. "Replicators?"

"Why take just McKay and Ronan?"

Lorne nodded but then reminded him "But Ronan got trapped in it. I mean it didn't look to me like it was interested in Ronan, just McKay."

He was right. Ronan, in trying to save McKay, had simply been taken along for the ride. Sheppard was glad for it, though, that Rodney was not alone wherever he had been taken to and with luck they were in that place still alive. McKay was a survivor, but he wasn't the same as the McKay of a few months ago. Somehow the physical changes in his body made him seem...more vulnerable now. Sheppard knew it was probably just his own hormones freaking out that Rodney was in danger because physically he felt Rodney's absence like a bleeding wound. His jaw ached and his nerve endings screamed to act – to do something – to find Rodney, to protect him, save him, comfort and touch him _right now!_

Only there was nothing they _could_ do. "We need to get back to Atlantis and get Zelenka in on this. He might be able to figure out a way to track the engine trail." It was unlikely. Track a ship through a slip stream? Never done before. "Let's go home."

XXX

Rodney, eyes still blissfully closed to all that was happening around him, never-the-less reflexively took in a deep breath. His lungs seemed shallow. A frustrated snort could be heard sounding far above him, drifting to his ear. Everything was muffled, but he was warm and comfortable. Presently he felt almost content.

A man of deep and angry words was speaking. Angry but not - he didn't think - angry at _him_.

"When will Doctor McKay awaken?"

His young physician looked nervous. "Should be anytime."

Kolya, eyes curious and watchful, nodded to the unconscious man. "When he does, have Fen' monitor him directly. If he gets...troublesome, be ready to give him a mild sedative."

"The only sedatives we have are the field worker's home brew or the physician's pareff."

"Then use pareff."

"It's only used for surgery. The smallest dose will knock him out for hours."

"Just...do what you can then, and keep Fen' outside the door. I want no one else here unless I am present, is that understood?" The voice drew closer. "I think he is awakening." Then right beside his ear. "You are awake, aren't you Doctor McKay? Or close enough. Listen to me. You know who I am. It would be better for you not to struggle against this. You are here now and that is your reality. You would be wise to accept it and adapt as quickly as possible...do you hear me doctor?"

Rodney, despite his best efforts to ignore the bastard, opened his eyes, and then squinting at the light and the face looking down on him. His vocal chords rough "Kolya," he said.

"Yes. You remember me."

"How could I forget?" He coughed. "The last time we met you tortured me."

"A thing I regret having to do but you left me little choice." A finger traced his jaw line, making him shiver. "Such a stubborn man."

"Sheppard should have killed you." Speaking was becoming exhausting. What the hell had they hit them with? "Wish he had."

"I'm sure you do. But you will soon feel differently."

Rodney frowned at that, a small smile crossing dry lips. "Ha." The very idea was ridiculous. "Go to hell."

Kolya smiled back and, surprisingly gently, cupped his chin in one massive hand. "I do not believe in your human hell, doctor, but you know that I can make Ronan's life here very unpleasant if you do not cooperate. So once again I say that in time you will change your attitude." His hated voice retreated. He was standing again and Rodney's eyes drifted shut, the invading hands and the hated voice leaving him in peace. "In the meantime, sleep well Rodney."

XXX

The meal they brought him was simple but tasty and he ate ravenously. Two days without decent food in his stomach and he had been feeling light-headed and nauseous. "He smells." Kolya had bellowed from outside the door once the simple food was eaten. "Fen', have a bath set for the doctor. I'm sure he would appreciate getting clean."

Beneath the words Rodney felt was another meaning though he could not put his finger on what, but Kolya's tone had softened, gentled, as though speaking of a favorite pet. However a bath sounded heavenly and, once the servant had vacated the room, he lowered himself into the bubbly warmth with relish, leaning his head back and savoring the sensation of his skin shedding the layers of oil and grime that had accumulated since his abduction.

The bath tub was massive, almost as large as a Jacuzzi, a free standing contraption of little elegance other than the hot soapy water that filled it and he scrubbed at his arms to rid himself of the dirt and dead skin cells, letting the wonderful soap, that smelled faintly of pine and flowers, sluice away days of fatigue and the humiliation of being neglected like a street urchin.

The door opened and Kolya stepped back into the room. When Rodney looked over he was shocked to see the man was naked form tip to toe and was walking toward the bath tub, clear what it was he had in mind. Rodney stood up, an automatic reaction to the dreadful thought that the man actually wanted to join him. Kolya was a thick, muscled man, hairy and solid, the very epitome of masculinity and McKay quickly turned his head away, furious at his racing heart.

When Rodney scrambled to get out, Kolya merely ignored him and stepped into the tub himself. "Water is a premium around here, doctor, we share baths whenever possible."

McKay swallowed nervously. "So you can put on the dirt others wash off?"

Kolya actually chuckled. "Well, I admit it is not ideal but we do what we can. You really should get back in, Doctor McKay, I am not going to touch you, and you are not all clean yet."

Rodney looked down at his body and sadly realised that Kolya was right. He still had a layer of grime on his legs that had not yet shifted and his hair was yet untouched, greasy and itchy. Shit. He really wanted to finish bathing but the idea of sharing a bath with Acustus Kolya was out of the question. Instead he walked over to the tub and, his face the very picture of defiance, dipped his head into the bath and the end farthest away from the Genii leader, soaking his hair through. Soaping it up quickly, he scrubbed for a minute and the then rinsed it the same way. Good enough. He backed away, shaking the water from his scalp and searching for a towel or something to wrap himself in.

Kolya just watched him idly, admiring the way the doctor's round ass moved as he walked around the large space. He liked the doctor's soft looking skin. It was nearly hairless and so _white_ and delicate looking, a pleasing layer of fat molded beautifully over the swell of muscles, the curves and dips of his chest, the soft lines of his hips and sides...fragile and very human, flawed but all the more pleasing because of it.

His cocked ached to see more, to view the front side of McKay with leisure, but the doctor was nothing if not recalcitrant and tucked a shirt around his middle before turning to face Kolya from across the room, plopping down on his narrow bed, glaring at him from beneath fierce, stubborn eyes.

Delighted, Kolya laughed.

XXX

Chuck reported nothing amiss during their absence. "I'm sorry, sir, no indications of any ships in the area, either before or after your encounter. I'm checking with local Intel' to see if anyone's heard of a rouge vessel or even pirates or, well, anything." He said feeling helpless.

Sheppard nodded. He had a sneaky suspicion. "Check with the Genii. They're not exactly our allies but at least we've got a truce of sorts going. Maybe they know something. Call me when you get through. I want to speak to them personally."

Sheppard made his way to the infirmary for his post mission check, remembering there was at least one Genii that had shown more than a passing interest in McKay. Nothing had come down the wire yet but maybe the virus had wiped out their women as well? And at the time Kolya, according to Elizabeth, had seemed to take a special interest in McKay, though back then it had been over his big brain and that interest had turned violent. Still, the Genii commander had spent some considerable time around McKay so who was to say the hormonal thing didn't work over distance and time? Who knew about anything in Pegasus? As galaxies went, it was nuts.

"Colonel," Beckett greeted him soberly. "I'm sorry to hear about Ronan and Rodney."

Sheppard nodded, hopping up on the exam table without being asked. He'd had hundreds of post mission checks and knew the routine by heart. "Yeah."

"Any idea what happened to them?"

He shook his head, waiting anxiously for word from Chuck. "Not yet."

"Well, they're both strong men...in their ways."

Sheppard nodded, not really listening to Beckett's platitudes. Ronan he knew could take care of himself. Rodney on the other hand...Sheppard hesitated to sell the scientist short. McKay had faced down some pretty nasty situations and come through more or less in one piece, but things were different now, weren't they? Wasn't Rodney even more vulnerable now that he was...but being an Altered didn't make him weak, it just made him seem weaker somehow. Sheppard knew it was irrational but the thought of McKay being touched or, worse, manhandled or hurt – or even _bruised_ - left his chest tight and his lungs breathless. "Doc', I think I'm..." Sheppard began and then stopped. What could the doc' do about it anyway?

"Yes...what Colonel?"

Was he in love with Rodney? He felt around inside his mixed up feelings. Love? Cared about him? For sure. In love?...his emotions were too wild to know precisely what he felt. Lust? No question, he could hardly keep his hands to himself around the man. And he felt this compromised him as a leader. He absolutely could not afford to lose control in a situation like the one he was facing. "I think I need a pill or something."

"What sort of pill?"

He blushed. "I can't keep my head about me when I'm around Rodney. I can't think straight, I think your damn...hormonal thing's got me good."

Beckett's face softened. "It's not exactly my hormonal thing but I think I understand you. I'm afraid I have nothing to help you, medicine-wise that is. There is however only one thing that I've observed that calms the -ahem – seeking male."

"Oh? What's that?"

"Well, _mating_ with the Altered of his desire. Having sex." Beckett busied his hands with his stethoscope, trying to keep his eyes averted in order to respect, at least somewhat, Sheppard's privacy. "Stackhouse's fellow calmed right down once they began – er – sleeping together regularly."

Sheppard rubbed tired eyes. At the thought of sleeping with Rodney, his cock twitched. He whispered "I was afraid you'd say that." The exam finished, Sheppard slipped easily off the table and said, not looking at Beckett. "Um, you won't say anything...?"

Beckett looked slightly affronted. "Of course not, Colonel. Anything we discuss is doctor/patient privilege."

Sheppard slapped him on the shoulder. "Thanks doc'."

Sheppard retreated to a quick shower in his quarters, pumping his cock violently in his hand as he imagined Rodney's smooth and deliciously tight ass clenching around his dick and the scientist's gorgeous eyes looking up at him and moaning his name over and over until they both came. Toweling off afterward, he felt calmer. Ronan was right. It did help. Problem was there were few places to masturbate in Atlantis outside his own quarters and he could hardly excuse himself from his duties every time he got a boner.

Chuck called him from the control room and Sheppard quickly dressed in fatigues, jogging back to Control and the main screen.

"Genii leader Ladon on screen sir." Chuck said.

Sheppard steeled himself. Ladon was less of a hard ass than Cowen had been, so Sheppard steeled himself to be civil, though he doubted exchanging pleasantries was not high on the list Genii leader's mind either. "Laden."

"Sheppard," Ladon seemed surprised. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

Not caring to stand on manners, Sheppard said "I need to know if there are any factions of the Genii that have...broken off...two of my people have been kidnapped and I have a suspicion it might be an old acquaintance of yours."

"I have no knowledge of any other dealings with your people."

A half truth if ever he heard one. "So there _is_ someone who's broken off."

Ladon scratched his whisker-shadowed chin. "There may be news, but we need supplies."

Sheppard figured this wasn't going to be cheap. "What sort of supplies?"

"Medicines, weapons, food."

"Medicines and food we can spare you a little. Not weapons. _Never_ weapons."

Ladon seemed to accept the answer as given and nodded his head. "Fine. You send us enough medicine and food to meet our immediate needs and we'll send you everything we know about Acustus Kolya." Ladon smiled. "I assume that is the acquaintance to which you are referring."

"It is." Sheppard agreed. "I need the planet or ship he is on, a Gate address, his contingent of men, his weapons status, his motives, whatever you have."

"Done. It isn't much, Colonel."

"We'll figure out the rest." Sheppard assured him. "We do a direct exchange. You transmit the information and once we verify it isn't bullshit, we send the food and medicine through to whatever Gate address you specify."

Ladon shook his head. "No. I have no assurance you'll keep your side of the bargain."

"All right I can appreciate that my good word might be a bit wobbly with you folks. We send you the food, you send us the half the Intel' –the most crucial – then we send the medicine, and then you send the rest of the Intel'. Deal?"

"That would suffice I think." Ladon said. "When I have the information, I'll call you. Approximately two hours shall we say?"

"Two hours."

XXX

"How is your meal?"

As loudly as his stomach growled Rodney did not taste any of it, instead staring across the table at Acustus Kolya who was chewing contentedly on his dinner of some sort of stewed meat and vegetables. Warm, fresh baked bread sat in a small basket, steam rising from it tantalizingly, tickling his nostrils, making him ravenous. But still he did not eat.

"You should eat, Doctor McKay. Surely you must be hungry. I am aware you know of your condition and by now your blood sugars will be dropping quite low. And..." Kolya broke off a chunk of bread, dipping it in the gravy and popping it into his mouth, "the food is getting cold." He chewed, savouring the taste. "It is quite good."

Rodney finally realised there was little point in a hunger strike since he would be unconscious before he made it through the third day, and took up a piece of break himself, biting off a good portion. It was good and he was starving.

Kolya looked highly satisfied then and so Rodney hated him even more. "Where's Ronan?"

Acustus spooned some stew into his mouth and spoke around the food "He is well enough and working in our fields – under guard of course. That is where he will do the most good here. A strong man."

"I want to see him."

"Not possible I'm afraid. You would be sure to plot together and try to escape, and any such plan would be sure to fail. Even if you did escape the compound, where would you go? There is a wild planet out there and the Genii – and now you of course - is the only civilization on it."

"I won't help you, you know." Rodney told him. "Whatever it is you brought me here for, I won't cooperate. So you can forget me fixing your machines or building your bombs or anything else."

"That is not what I have brought you here for, Doctor McKay, as I am certain you are already aware." Kolya looked over at him above the rim of the cup of whatever beverage he was drinking with his meal. "And you will cooperate, eventually, in the end. Your hormones, your drives, whatever you humans call it, will succumb as the others have done. Oh you will resist me, perhaps for weeks, maybe even months, but soon enough you will surrender to me, you will even like me, perhaps even love me someday."

Rodney snorted.

Kolya kept talking, ignoring his prisoner's rude noise. "You will have no choice, your body will decide for you. And perhaps you will not find it so unpleasant after all."

"In your dreams."

"No, in my bed," Kolya said sounding altogether too confident. "In my bed, and sooner than you might suspect."

"Why are you doing this?" Rodney asked, feeling his own bravery slipping, slowly slipping here and there. He had not seen Ronan for days and there had been no indication of any rescue attempt. He also did not recognise this facility, so he knew they were not on the Genii home world any longer or, if they were, they were in a new hiding spot – maybe another bunker. "You have other Al-" He had almost said the hated word "_men_ here. Why me?"

Kolya frowned a little. "Have you not yet come to realise, doctor that I am taken with you, and have been for some time? This newest physiological development is merely – how do you Lanteans say it? - icing on the cake?"

"They'll come looking for me, you know. I'm an important man in Atlantis - they won't stop until they find me."

Kolya remembered the doctor's opinion of himself. It had not faded with time. "You mean "us" do you not?" and was satisfied at the blush that suddenly coloured the doctor's fare skin.

"Of course I mean _us_." He snarled.

Kolya smiled, self satisfied. "Of course your Satedan friend is not nearly so valuable to us, or to Sheppard, as you are so I think I understand the slip."

"Screw you! I don't care what you think you feel for me, I _hate_ you and I'll fight you every step."

The smile left the tall man's pock marked face. "I applaud your resolve."

Kolya left and McKay heard as he slid the bolt into place. It sounded heavy and solid. No way was he getting through that door without help.

Outside Kolya spoke to his underling. "Withhold food until his evening meal."

"What time shall I feed him, sir?"

Kolya considered for a few seconds. "Late. Very late. I want him to feel a certain level of deprivation that I doubt he has ever had to feel, and the doctor needs to learn a little gratitude."

XXX

Chuck reported no significant problems during his commander and his team's absence but noted the missing scientist and the lack a Ronan Dex. "What happened sir?"

Sheppard bypassed Atlantis's main control room and headed for his office with Chuck in tow. "_Major_ snafu. I need all up-to-date Intel' on the Wraith, the Genii and pretty well any other group we've ever come across who has so much as looked at us sideways."

"Uh, yes sir. Right away." Chuck hurried off to comply with his leader's request while Sheppard threw himself into his chair. Changing his mind, he stood, removed his weapon-belt and the Glock 9 mm, removing the clip and ensuring the safety was on, placing it carefully on the table, and then sitting back down. Better. More comfortable. Less reassuring though. He liked the feel of his sidearm strapped to his leg, it made him ready for anything, anywhere, anytime.

Sheppard rested his face in his hands, his elbows on the table, trying to settle his screaming nerves. He knew he was due for a post-mission check but did not want to face Carson and his questions just yet. Rodney was gone. Ronan, too. Ronan he knew could take care of himself but Rodney...Rodney...who would have taken him and why? Who...who...? A hundred past missions flashed across his mind and the enemies Atlantis had accumulated over the years. Names, faces, assholes - who would want McKay and why?

For his brain? Sure, best brain he had ever met; creative, brilliant, freaks out a bit when the clock is ticking but could think on his feet better than anyone he knew, and McKay seemed to know so _much_, not just astrophysics and all that gravity, velocity and mass stuff but engineering, electronics, computer language, alien computer languages, even the _Ancient's_ language...the man was crazy intelligent and not to even start in on his love of food and its many varieties...

"Uh, Colonel Sheppard?"

Sheppard snapped his head up.

Radek Zelenka was at his door, clearing his throat a bit nervously. "Uh, I need to speak to Rodney."

Fuck! He had forgotten to let Radek know about his latest mission fail. "Rodney, McKay is gone, Ronan too. What's the problem?" Sheppard asked.

"Uh, nothing major, just we've finished sweeping Atlantis for listening and visual devises. We found a few more and deactivated them all."

Sheppard nodded. "Good...uh good work." He stood wearily. "Look, um, Carson's expecting me for a post mission check but about Rodney..." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, "I'll explain what happened on the way to the infirmary and you can fill me in on who made these listening devises. I've got a feeling I know who put them there."

Radek perked up. "Oh – the Genii."

Sheppard stopped and stared at him. "Are you sure?"

"No doubt about it. The tech' style is Genii, absolutely."

Sheppard patted him on one shoulder. "Thanks Radek, that's really good work." He sighed loudly. One hurdle down. "I don't suppose you can pin-point where they might have originated, you know, which planet, maybe the Gate address...?"

Radek looked crestfallen. "Uh, sorry Colonel, but we might be able to determine where the parts were purchased. The Genii home world may have manufactured their own raw materials but as I said the style of these are Genii but the components look a bit make-shift. It's Genii know-how but probably foreign-built parts. Possible Farusion Traders or The Boran people."

"The Boran are pirates, aren't they?"

Radek nodded. "Yes, very violent, generally unpleasant pirate-types."

"But space-going." Sheppard reminded him. "And they just might know the location of this new Genii threat."

XXX

"Sir?" Kolya looked up from his reports. The new colony under him was doing well, save for the shortage of breedable men. But reports still came in of some crop failures and other minor difficulties. More raids would be needed to supplement their supplies. He would need to arrange one as soon as possible, and that meant putting off starting his own family.

His servant and guard stood at the door. "What is it Fen'? Why are you away from your post?"

"I left Jazzar to watch him. Um, sir, he...the doctor seems to be ill."

Kolya froze for a moment. "In what way? Are you certain it isn't a ruse? Doctor McKay is very clever."

"Well, sir, he was screaming through the door all day for food but your instructions were to-"

"I am aware of what my orders were, just give me your report."

"He stopped yelling a while ago, not too long, so I went in, sir. I know you forbade me to do so without your presence but I thought it prudent..."

"Yes, yes,_ and_?"

"And he appears to be in some sort of fever, sweating, cold, shaking. Could it be a Genii virus do you think?"

"Did you call for our physician?"

"Yes, but I had to send someone to fetch him from above ground. He is attending a broken arm at the farmer's hospital."

"I see." Kolya stood and his servant followed him back to his own chambers. "Unbolt the door."

Fen' swiftly removed the cross-bolt and, turning a key in the hole, unlocked the door, allowing his commander to enter first.

Kolya immediately went to where his captive was slumped against a wall, still refusing to use the comfortable bed provided. Doctor McKay was indeed looking unwell. Kolya crouched down on his heels and felt the man's forehead. It was not feverish but clammy, and McKay was trembling slightly. When Kolya placed two fingers at his throat, he felt a rather fast pulse, too fast if he was correctly remembering the rate of the average human heartbeat.

"I am glad you thought to fetch me, Fen', he does appear ill." Kolya kept his words calm and professional while inside his guts twisted at the thought that his short-sightedness might well be killing the object of his deeply burning desire. "Please send a second messenger for our doctor and tell them this is an emergency. The broken arm can wait."

XXX

Kolya paced anxiously for the physician's report on his ill guest. His exterior was controlled, no one would think anything was amiss. But he could not help the urgency in his voice when the colony's physician appeared at his office door. Taking his seat behind his desk he asked "Will he be all right doctor?"

Doctor Storr, an older man with no hair and spectacles, sat down in the chair Kolya indicated across from the imposing desk. The desk, the two chairs, and a substantial oil lamp were the only furnishings the room contained. The light from the oil lamp reflected off the doctor's shiny head.

The physician cleared his throat. "Em, yes, commander, he is stable now. As far as I was able to glean from his mutterings and from my own examination, he needs regular feeding to avert this sort of reaction. Apparently his body is defective in the way it processes food sugars. He produces too much of a certain enzyme he refers to as Insulin, and when there is too much of that and not enough sugars in his blood this type of thing can occur."

Furious at himself for his oversight in not taking the time to discover ahead of time any possible concerns in the scientist's health, Kolya never-the-less kept his expression perfectly controlled. "So unless he is fed regularly, this will happen again?"

"Uh yes."

"What would have happened if we had not caught it in time?" Kolya could not help the thick clenching in his throat, like he was suddenly suffocating.

"Well, the brain lives on sugars, and not just his of course, ours as well, so eventually he would have fallen into unconsciousness – a coma is what the humans call it I believe – and sometime after his –er - _death_ would have come."

"I see. He is well now?"

Storr scratched his face. "He is recovering. I had some high sugar food brought to him immediately and he is eating now."

Kolya swallowed the lump and sat back, softly letting out a held breath. "Thank you doctor, you may go."

Storr, greatly relieved, stood and gave his leader a slight bow. "Thank you sir."

Kolya entered his quarters. McKay was seated at the round table in the center of the room, finishing up a bowl of soup. When he saw who it was who had entered, however, he pushed it away. "Now what? Are you going to cut off my air, or let me die of thirst?"

"I apologise for...what happened. Had we known..."

"Well you didn't _bother_ to ask did you?" McKay snapped. "Since when do the Genii look twice at their prisoner's anyway? Why do you even care?"

"I have made myself clear as to why I care. I wish to start a family and have chosen you as my bearer."

"I don't care that you care, Kolya. Feed me or not, I'll never willingly submit to..._that_."

Kolya sighed. "I had hoped after a time you would...become _wise_ and come to understand that, whether you hold out hopes otherwise, you are here permanently as my consort and child bearer. You cannot go home again, you cannot escape, and soon, you will come to appreciate my...affections. Our researcher's have assured me of this. It is now in your genes to do so, you see, and inevitable."

"Screw you. Genes or no genes I can still make choices and my choice is to hate you."

Kolya stood straighter, his eyes narrowed, and then he all but leaped across the room, powerful hands grabbing Rodney by his upper arms and hauling him from the table, then lifting him off his feet and pushing him up against the rough masonry wall. Kolya saw with some satisfaction the sudden fear in the scientist's eyes and the human's lungs pumping out the quicker breaths as his heart rate sped up at the unexpected contact and the fury in his captor's eyes.

Kolya brought his face to within an inch of his prisoner's, his nose taking in the scent of him, his black pupils peering at the shades of blue in the doctor's irises. He wanted to take him right then, with force and all the roughness his loins had been demanding off him since laying his hands on the "_altered",_ and much coveted, Doctor Rodney McKay. But his will was greater than his lusts and he suddenly let him go, walking away to the other side of the room, to the door. "You will soon see things my way, doctor."

Kolya took another deep breath, gathering his wits and lusts into one controlled arena. He added, almost wistfully "If I had my wish..." but the Genii leader shook his head, dispelling such sentiment. "But that is not important now. In two weeks I leave for four days on a mission of mercy for my people. When I return from that mission, I intend to plant a son in you." His cock stirred, twitching at the thought. "And then many sons more. You have that long to temper your...state of will, shall we say. However, be assured that whether you submit to me willingly or not, do not doubt that one way or another, you _will_ submit to me. That is in _my_ hands. How pleasant or unpleasant our life together becomes is in _yours_."

Once the door had closed and he heard the bolt sliding into place, Rodney's knees gave out and he sank to the floor, his limbs still shaking. Kolya had just announced his intention to rape him. Rodney ran trembling fingers through his short hair. Maybe it was time for an alternate plan of attack. Somehow he had to gain Acustus Kolya's trust and get away before that happened.

Even though it still made his skin crawl, he had to start cooperating and even maybe showing some level of affection, or he would never get Kolya to unbolt the door.

XXX

The next part of Habit of Force and Someone Somewhere (which next chapter is close to complete but not quite yet done), are, I am sorry to say, a few weeks off since I will not have a free weekend now until July! But we'll see how much I can get done with the bits of free time I do have between now and then. Lots more to come and a brand new story after these two are complete! Thank you for reading, and for your patience and the reviews too!


	5. Chapter 5

**A Habit of Force Part 5 **

G.E. Waldo

**WARNING!: -** This story is Rodney-mpreg, Rodney/Kolya, Rodney/Ronan-Sheppard-Beckett. Angst, violence. Adult! (Character death of all females in chapter 1!).

Please excuse my ridiculous screw-up by putting a _dead_ Dr. Weir into a scene with Sheppard! Okay, so here's the fixed chapter! Sorry and thanks for your patience.

SGASGASGASGASGASGASGASGASGA

His grandfather on his mother's side had been a farmer as had been his great-grandfather on his father's side. For a lifetime both men had worked the soil to feed not only their families but the towns within range of their trading routes.

With the next high arcing swing of his cutter Ronan recalled his mother's father explaining to him the life of a farmer, and that it was hard but noble work. "It is an honor" he had often said "to feed your family and the families of your neighbors."

And then First Wraith had come, and the beginnings of the traditions of war, and his father had enlisted as a Frontman and learned weapons and fighting instead of seeds and soil. When Ronan was of age, his other grandfather had taught him how to hunt and track and kill animals and then, once he was a little older, how to kill the white devils. When his father was taken by a Wraith Dart, he enlisted himself at the age of fourteen, learning the ways of war and soon after farming was forgotten.

Ronan smirked at the inferior cutting tools of the Genii. A Satedan scythe would have two blades, cutting the grain stalks in two even lengths, half-ing the work of those who came after to stack or thresh. Then, years later, had come the great grain machines and the men had gone on to other work. But still, his own style of harvesting put most of the other workers to shame, as his strength was nearly three times that of the other men slaves. He reminded himself that he was not doing the work for the Genii, but simply as a way to keep his hands occupied so as not to wrap them around the throat of any nearby armed Genii guard which would no doubt bring the other guards and a swift bullet to his brain.

Ronan grunted as he swung the instrument again, imagining the head of every Genii being lopped off and rolling in between the rows of the harvest. The fields were white with grain and it was hot work, but killing any Genii right now was not the smart thing to do and being so many years with Earth's Lantean's and, in particular, John Sheppard, had taught him that sometimes patience was needed.

Patience and a plan. He needed both not only to stay alive but to escape and, somehow, rescue Rodney from the clutches of the hated Kolya. Sweat stinging his eyes in the oppressive heat, Ronan swung the cutting blade while in his mind bloody Genii heads rolled.

XXX

"You're not eating your Munkin cakes." Kolya said, noticing that his house guest was also picking at his food that night, pushing it around on the plate instead of eating it with his usual gusto. With a well worn napkin Kolya wiped his mouth and sat back, leaving his own plate still unfinished. "And you've lost weight, Rodney."

Rodney gritted his teeth at the unwelcomed use of his first name from the Genii leader. Thinking better than to snap his captor's head off with a few well placed insults he grumbled "You're keeping me locked in here all day, every day. I've been here for months and you've never let me go out, or see anyone, or do any useful work. I've read your pathetic collection of books five times and I'm bored out of my skull." He threw his wooden fork down on his plate with a clatter. "Of course I'm losing weight genius – I have no appetite. Who _would_?"

For the moment Kolya ignored the insult, taking a moment to consider his room-but-soon-to-be-_actual_-mate. "I could let you leave our quarters – under guard of course – you could assist our engineers with the refining of our naquadah ore. I understand you have some experience working with it."

McKay's eyes widened. "_Some_ experience – are you joking? I _am_ the experience. I'm the one who engineered the naquadah generators used on -" Suddenly he stopped, realising he had already said more than he intended, not wanting to remind him that Atlantis was short not only their biggest and meanest warrior but their best in the galaxy brain. "I-I mean...I have a lot of experience."

Kolya nodded, satisfied with the information his guest had let escape. "Yes, I thought as much. Excellent, then you can lead the Engineering team." He went back to his plate of vegetable stew. "I must warn you, the team already assigned will resent your presence."

McKay waved away the potential for human static with a jerk of his wrist. "No problem. I'm _used_ to that."

Kolya's lids narrowed, eyeing his thus far sexually unwilling mate. "If you make one attempt, even one attempt, to escape Rodney –"

"I know, I know," he rolled his eyes "I'm dead. I get it."

"-I will have your friend Ronan Dex killed that same hour." Kolya Acustus scooped up another portion of the delicious stew – _really it was quite good tonight_ – and he chewed appreciatively. "I will have him shot and left for the animals in the forest."

McKay bit his lip, quiet for a moment. Then "Just so you know, I won't try and escape." Visions of Ronan's rotting or animal ravaged corpse lying in the woods, dying without honor – honor being the sort of end to his life the Satedan seemed to value highly - swam before his eyes. "You have my word." He had to make sure Ronan was safe. Maybe he couldn't save himself but he could do that at least.

Kolya nodded, his expression denoting that he had expected nothing else. "Excellent because, just so you know, I do not make idle threats."

Rodney wasn't about to wager otherwise.

XXX

They were brought underground once the harvest was over, and made to work in the naquadah mines. Gloves and face-masks – that was it. Ronan had no idea if that was sufficient protection for handling the highly reactive ore – Rodney was the one who knew that stuff – but he hoped it was. Once under their power, negotiation with the Genii was, as most had come to learn at some expense, not a healthy alternative to putting your head down and slogging.

Until the opportunity presented itself to kill them all of course.

Give him a good blaster for a sticky situation any day. Talk was for weaklings. Weaklings and really, really smart scientists. After a few months of laboring in the hot suns, Ronan had come to the uncomfortable conclusion that, unless he saw an obvious opening to an all out war of one against two hundred or more – a war where he had some chance of winning - he might have to leave it up to McKay to rescue them both. Rodney was no weakling, Ronan reminded himself, despite his grumbling during off-world missions. Weaklings didn't face down Wraith, Replicators and invasions during killer storms, and pleasingly pudgy scientists usually _never_ had to.

But Rodney was someone different than most of the brains he had met on Sateda and elsewhere. Despite the sheer terror on his face during any dire situation, McKay possessed a ball of iron inside him that allowed him to face those terrors and overcome. As Sheppard had once put it _"Don't let the scaredy-cat-"_ whatever that was-_ "thing throw you. When he need's 'em, Rodney's got guts."_

From what he knew of Sheppard, Ronan came to know that there was no way would the colonel have had the scientist on his team –the number one team - if McKay wasn't more than just a brain.

Ronan ate his bowl of soup quickly, almost drinking it down. Then sat back to chew the bread at leisure, watching the guards like he did every night, noting their pacing, their habitual idle chatter, their regularly scheduled breaks for visiting "The John", another term he had picked up from Sheppard. Most people were creatures of habit, slaves to their own bodily wants and their own preferences for sleep, talking, eating, bathing, resting their feet, even visiting the toilet. Their routines never varied and Ronan filed away every detail of every guard for when they might come in useful during the proper instant of time.

There were no cages here, no iron bars. Here, at the ass end of the Genii complex, in a square corner of un-used collections of stone cold rooms not far from the storage halls where they piled the sacks of grain ten high ready for winter, was where they slept. Not caging their prisoners was a mistake. But Ronan knew the Genii were arrogant, far more arrogant than they had any right to be, considering their history of barely surviving the Wraith and their encounters with the tactically superior Earth people.

Six armed Genii soldiers surrounded the group of twenty worker slaves every day and every night. Ronan smiled to himself. If he could get his hands on even one Genii weapon, it would take him less than five seconds to put all six soldiers down. Even shooting at an oblique angle on a dead run, he never missed. He'd kill them all and find Rodney, killing more on the way.

Ronan fell asleep imagining how much fun that was going to be.

XXX

Sheppard kicked the leg of his chair. "It's been months. Our people are out there while we sit here waiting and wasting time." It was hard not to grind his teeth at Landry's cautious but, he had to admit, usual good sense.

"Where should I send our ships, Colonel?" Landry asked from the small desk-top screen. Sheppard kept these Atlantis-SGC communications private now. Better not to remind his people that Earth remained a no-go zone. Landry looked like he hadn't slept in days. "Give me a trajectory, an emission trail – hell – I'll even take a good rumor, if even we had a ship available."

Months that had grown from weeks of hoping that had sprung from days of worry which had mushroomed from hours of numb shock. Soon, Sheppard knew as no doubt did the General, that months would become a year. Maybe even more.

"I want them back as much as you do, but we have our battles right now. The G'aould are making another play for Earth and we can only hope to still be here by this time next week."

They'd been at this, off and on, for almost all of those months, not at each other's throats, not prodigiously angry like a monsoon but in small doses, like summer gales that blew through in an hour and when they were over, they'd communicate again, each dripping with frustration and both angry as hell at their own failures. Little verbal eruptions now and again, both leaders feeling helpless.

Sheppard nodded, trying the millionth time to rub away a month of headaches with his fingers across his eyes. Nothing helped, even when something in the city was screwing up and there was no scientist to make it all better except Radek who had thus far come through time and again, it never seemed to ease his need to burst from his skin, shed all vestiges of restraint and beat his fists on the wall.

He looked back at Landry on the screen, knowing the general was waiting for him to speak. But no apologies this time. That too didn't help anything. It's not like he was going to be arrested any time soon for insubordination. They each had a galaxy riding on their backs. Regulations and protocol seemed almost laughable.

And as for the city malfunctions that cropped up Radek did his best, and most times his best was enough. John would slap him on the shoulder and mutter about a job well done while his insides secretly hated him for it. Rodney had been indispensible before, but now his mind shouted at him how_ irreplaceable_ Rodney was and that if they didn't get him back, the many parts of him inside and out would start falling apart. Sheppard knew it was partly the hormone thing, his or the lingering McKay molecules still hanging in the air or both, but he had to get him back, one way or another. That or roll over and shrivel up.

He even screamed at Becket once, like the Altered running around were somehow his fault. If only Rodney hadn't changed, everything would still be okay. McKay would be here and be normal and everything would still be as usual, and most of all, he wouldn't be missing him like a starving man missed a juicy, rare steak. That and his balls wouldn't feel like they were missing out on the most fantastic, intimate and mind blowing sexual experiences of their miserable, pathetic lives. He wanted McKay so badly his body just _hurt_ all the time and he knew although it was the sexual thing, it was also more. It _had_ to be more because his head was all fucked up over it, too. Beckett's rainbow of pills didn't do shit of course.

Perhaps sensing the younger's man's agony Landry capitulated. "We can spare one LT Drive ship, but it's equipped with minimal weapons. Where do you want us to start looking Colonel?"

_That way._ Sheppard wanted to say, dragging his mind back to the sadly familiar argument at hand. A _fucking-ship-of-some-fucking-kind-some-fucking-whe re. Out-there. _He knew it was ridiculous. And it was emotion. That's all he had right now. He took a calming breath, making himself sit down and sit still. All except for one thumb that twitched in its need to kick some alien ass. His mind swam with images he couldn't control, his body hurt for his empty bed and his balls ached whenever he thought of Rodney - which was most of the time. _Fucking goddamn galaxy!_

The general watched him coolly, waiting for whatever, Sheppard's jaw so taut Landry thought it might splinter. He knew Sheppard was out of ideas, as were their own SGC science team, and because they all knew they were a pretty smart group, it meant the colonel's missing people were probably fucked.

He loathed saying it because it was true. "I don't know." Then a faint hope - "Anything at all on intel'?" He asked wearily, hoping for some bit of news that Landry had kept from him because the general thought it was too dangerous to pursue, or because as much as Landry wanted to help, what he also wanted was to _not _lose any more people in the Pegasus galaxy. They were down to minimal numbers as it was as they both knew it.

Landry sighed, wishing he had something to give the younger man who, despite his reputation for forging ahead and almost always coming out on top, in their current crises was learning all too quickly that no matter how much you wanted it and no matter how much you were _willing_ to do, sometimes there was nothing that you _could_ do. "No."

XXX

Barrod, his armed escort who accompanied him whenever he left his rooms to go work, liked cakes.

The little soft cinnamon-tasting, sweet two-bite spice cakes that Kolya had his baker cook up for Rodney almost every day so he could just pop one in his mouth whenever his hypoglycemia threatened to cloud his mind or make his fingers shake. Rodney even carried a few with him in a small bag so he could snack on them whenever he wanted. It was the _one _consolation of having to share quarters, if not yet a bed, with his captor, a man who enjoyed not only bragging about how many kids he was going to _infect _Rodney with (the very word _impregnate_ made him nauseous and anything so domestic and controlling sounding in association with his future rapist bordered on obscene), but who inside their quarters walked around naked most evenings.

Rodney wondered if the man also, by virtue of unabashedly displaying himself, was bragging about _that_ too. Not that the man was ugly. In fact, from his well muscled torso to his wide shoulders, narrow waste and dark body hair that seemed to sprout from every crevice, Acustus possessed one of the most masculine bodies Rodney had ever seen. Not that it made him attractive, not much anyway. _Definitely not!_

Sheppard was far prettier, and if there was one thing about Sheppard none could deny, the man was just pretty through and through. Rodney had seen the colonel naked plenty of times, too, but not in any situation resembling the one he currently found himself in. Lots of other times, though. Sheppard and him in showers after a mission, scrubbing away days of grime or sluicing off each other's caked blood...unpleasant time mostly.

Or both of them naked in Becket's infirmary with the evil doctor inserting tubes into every orifice his invading Scottish fingers could locate, their often mostly exposed backsides shivering in the absurdly cold air of the recovery ward, which goose-fleshed skin was inevitable inadequately covered by the doctor's universally hated medical gowns. Again, unpleasant.

He'd seen Sheppard sans every stitch of clothing enough times to recognise a physical form that was truly artful. Not that he had ever told Sheppard that, the man was already insufferable about his hair.

But at least Kolya brought him all the cakes he could eat. Cakes he had noticed Barrod often looking at and licking his lips over. The kind of looking that said he was trying not to look, but Rodney could hear the belly grumbles from the man and so started saving half of the little cakes, tucking them away in the cupboard – Kolya's private cupboard where he kept a few of his personal things - and where Barrod wouldn't _dare_ peek.

You never knew when the little cakes might come in useful. A good bribe often went a long way, especially when it came to a young soldier with a sweet tooth who had only boring vegetable stew to look forward to almost every night for dinner and with no desert chaser.

Sweet, tasty chasers that he himself possessed in abundance.

God bless hypoglycemia.

XXX

"Barrod." Rodney said one day after Kolya had left for the day.

Barrod looked up from his paper and stylus pass-time – some sort Genii language of word play guess-what-comes-next game - and regarded him idly. "You are not supposed to talk to me." Then went back to his game, adding "And I'm not supposed to talk to you."

Rodney knew this of course, it was one of Acustus's strict protocols when he was not in the room. The Genii commander did not want any of his regiment getting any ideas about getting too close to his very special captive, and the lads of the service knew it all too well. One lingering look and Kolya would have their rank erased. And probably one eye.

"Look, I want to talk to my friend."

"Not going to happen." Barrod said.

But Rodney plunged ahead. At the rate that he and Ronan were _not_ being rescued, he had little to lose. "Look, I know we're not supposed to talk but I just want to see him for a few minutes. You can take me there. It's deeper inside this place isn't it? Right? It's not like we'll be going to the surface – it'd be impossible for me to escape."

At Barrod's continued silence, Rodney played his better card. "You can have my cakes."

At that Barrod did look up and Rodney hurried on "I've been saving them - getting kinda' sick of them actually. But there's maybe a half dozen-" then remembering that the Genii didn't know about the Earth term he added "I mean six or seven left. There all yours, I just want to see Ronan for a few minutes."

Barrod blinked and Rodney could see the little wheels – wheels substantially smaller and clunkier than his own – going around his brain.

"Please? Kolya won't be back for another four hours and it's night time now, so most of the other Genii will be asleep. Just a few guards here and there. You -you can tell them Kolya demanded my presence in the lower levels. That's where the slaves are kept anyway – right? Near the water tanks and the grain storage? No one will dare question it because it...it's from _Kolya_. Please?" He tried to keep the tremor out of his vice. He wanted to see a familiar face so badly and not only that but the date of Kolya's leaving and returning, and so his promise to Rodney to implant a half-Genii parasite in his body, was fast approaching.

Escape seemed impossible, but maybe he could at least save himself _that_ particular indignity.

With Ronan's help that is. "Please? I'm going crazy in this place." That was true enough. He found he was talking to himself again, like when the city had been under siege from the Wraith or when he'd been trapped in the sinking Jumper. Alone, terrified and no help coming - he'd _thought_. _"Please?"_

Ten minutes later, they were winding their way down into the cool bowels of the Genii's underground, depressingly dim, city-sized bunker. Barrod, while keeping his eye and weapon trained on Rodney, spoke to one the guards keeping watch over the sleeping workers. Rodney watched as the slave guard regarded him for a few seconds, and then nodded, holding up his hand, fingers spread. Rodney knew it meant he had very few minutes to ask Ronan what he had come to ask.

As, with a bitter and sweet pang of familiarity and affection, he saw Ronan appear from a shadowed corner and walk towards him, flanked by Barrod and the other guard, and suddenly he wasn't so sure he could do it.

Rodney looked at Barrod. "Alone." He said to Barrod, who nodded and reiterated. "Five minutes exactly. I'll be just over there with my weapon trained on his skull." He said, nodding to the back of Ronan's thick dreads. The young Barrod walked about ten meters away and stood waiting.

Without warning Rodney found himself engulfed in thick arms and almost lifted off the floor, the air in his lungs squeezed out in a rush, making him grunt.

When Ronan released him, he straightened his ill-fitting Genii sewn jacket and said. "Uh, yeah, uh-huh, g-good to see you too." Then he tucked his elbow in at his side, grimacing. "Only I could have lived without the cracked rib."

Ronan smiled. It was his all but patented still-a-tough-guy-who-could-kick-your-ass-to-the-n ext-planet-so-don't-comment-on-how-cute-it-is smile, but it was all Ronan. "How are you?"

Rodney knew their allotted time was now down to four minutes. Lowering his voice he spoke fast "Look, I'm fine but we don't have much time, so just listen." He cleared his throat nervously. "Um, look...look - Kolya's basically told me he wants to..._breed_ me...he's going to force himself on me actually and as much as I hate the idea of getting pregnant in this hell hole, that idea isn't half as bad as having a baby with a psychopath for a father so I was hoping...that is I was wondering...I mean I know we were never close, not close friends...team-mates yes, and you've saved my life more times than I can remember and I've saved your too...and it's a lot to ask and I know I wouldn't be your first choice...or most people's for that matter but I was hoping..." Rodney knew he was babbling and closed his mouth, biting his lip so hard it hurt. "I was wondering if you wouldn't mind..." he stopped again, finding it impossible to actually say the words. It was too much, he realised. Too much to ask of a friend, especially of this friend. And it was too weird, too. Too out there for either of them.

Rodney suddenly felt it, up real close, right next to his skin, how badly the universe sucked. He was going to get raped and impregnated by a psycho and there wasn't shit he could about it.

Ronan's eyes had never left the troubled face of his friend during the awkward monologue and when Rodney's stuttering speech peered out and he dropped his head down to examine his fingers, Ronan took one great paw and lifted his chin back up. "I know what you're asking McKay."

Rodney hands shook. "I know it's a lot to ask, but if I _have_ to go through with this anyway, if...he's giving me no_ choice_ – he's even told me the _date_ like it's something I supposed to anticipate or something – so-so if this _has_ to happen...then I don't want it to be his. I mean I thought...I figure if I was already, you know, _that way_ then...I want it t-to be, um, to be y-yours..." At Ronan's silence he said miserably. "I know it's a _huge_ favor..."

The big Satedan frowned. "Don't think that." He scolded, his hand still on the smaller man's chin, still holding on to his friend, his large thumb stroking the strong line of the scientist's jaw once, twice, very softly. "Don't _ever_ think it would be a favor, like you weren't _worth_ it." Ronan leaned down and put his lips on Rodney's slightly open, slightly shocked ones, just briefly, and then let him go. "What makes you think I haven't already thought about it?"

Rodney swallowed. "Oh...ah...I-I...didn't...oh..." He had no idea what else to say and Ronan was glad to see there were at least some things in the known universe that could close the great chasm that was McKay's mouth and somehow it tickled him to know that what he just did was one of them.

Ronan glanced with his eyes to the two guards. Had they seen the kiss? He didn't care. If they were going to do this, if McKay was going to be carrying their baby, then it only gave him more incentive to kill every last one of the Genii bastards and escape with his child. And with his _mate_. Mc-_Rodney_ - would essentially become _his_. At least under Satedan law, Rodney McKay would be his _mate_. It even sounded weird thinking it. In so many ways it was...basically _nuts_.

But it still felt good.

Their time had to be down to seconds now. Ronan whispered "But where, when...?"

"Two days from now Kolya leaves for two weeks. In four days I'll come for you."

"How?"

"Leave it to me." Rodney added "Barrod likes cakes."

"_What?"_

"Never mind. I'll figure it out."

Ronan didn't doubt that McKay could do that. The little scientist had lots of brains and lots of ideas. He liked that about Rodney. There were a lot of things he liked about Rodney. Especially now. Most especially being this close to him. "Okay."

Rodney and his Genii escort disappeared and Ronan was returned to his spot on the hard floor to sleep away the rest of the night.

Except instead of sleep he tried to imagine the coming merging of his body with Rodney's altered one, and the feel of how his hungry cock would glide inside Rodney's soft, lovely ass to plant what would essentially become Atlantis's first half Satedan/half Earth-child offspring. Through sheer force of soldier will Ronan kept his hands off his now achingly hard cock bulging in his pant-leg and tried to get what few hours remained of rest.

XXX

Kolya forced his lips open and plunged his mouth. Almost choking on the grossly long tongue of the Genii leader, Rodney could taste the morning tea and grain stew that had made up Kolya's breakfast. "Mmmm." Kolya moaned as he forced Rodney's lips apart again and again, keeping the 'Lanten's head in place with a massive claw-like hand clamped around the back of his neck. Rodney could not have turned away if he tried. Kolya finally broke away, letting Rodney breathe a little. "I could take you right now."

That made Rodney's stomach lurch every which way. "But...but you're ...I mean they're all waiting on you right now." He said, referring to the unit of troops the Genii leader was taking with him. It was hardly convincing but was willing to say just about anything to get the man to finally, once-and-for-all-and-for-Christ's-sake _leave!_

"They would wait without question." Kolya assured him.

Of course they would. "But then I won't have time to..." Rodney swallowed forcing the rest passed his lips without puking or looking like he wanted to. "But then I wouldn't have the time to...you know...get myself ready."

Kolya stood taller. "Ready? Ready for what?"

"Ready to..." He looked down at his fingers; it was a habit he had picked up around Kolya. Fortunately the commander took it as a gesture of personal and/or sexual shyness, but what it was actually was the only way he knew how to hide his eyes whenever he bold-faced lied. He sucked at lying. Sheppard had told him often enough that it had to be true so over the years he had learned to control the tremor in his voice but had never been able to conquer the truth that leaked out his traitorous eyes like water from a rusty faucet.

"Um...I've been reading that Genii people, when they're about to get married, will participate in a week long ritual of bathes and oil massages and stuff to...well, get, you know,_ physically_ ready for the big day." He finally raised his eyes, eyes he had been told were as blue as a mountain lake with long eyelashes so pretty they could melt the heart of even the most stoic superior – if used the right way – and he hoped like hell they would have the same affect on Kolya. "I thought I might...do s-some of that...for you." He looked down again and said softly, in a whisper just a shade sad "If...if that's okay with you that is."

Kolya captured his lips once more, this time kissing him gently and lovingly. Rodney had to admit, when the man wanted to, he could certainly kiss because Rodney could feel it in his knees. Too bad the lips belonged to a rapist freak with visions of godhood.

When Kolya let him go, Rodney waited, his heart pounding in his ribcage. To his horror just then Kolya reached out a hand, laying it on his chest. The astute Genii leader had to be feeling his rapid heart that was beating anxiously in its anticipation for Kolya to leave, to go away and give him two weeks of relative freedom. Rodney experienced a second of sheer terror; certain Kolya could read the true meaning behind the organ's pulse and cancel the trip altogether.

But for once blind luck was on his side and the Genii commander smiled; a tiny almost not there upward curving of the corners of his lips. "I see you are excited as I am - about our bed sharing. I am very happy to see you have...altered your perception of me."

Rodney said a silent hallelujah, being extra careful not to show any sign of relief on his face. He swallowed thickly and just stared at the large, calloused fingers resting above his heart. "I'm trying..."

Kolya spoke uncharacteristically kindly, his voice warm with affection. "I know you are. The past few months you have worked very well here, and very hard, even making efforts to get along with the others. We are ahead in our efforts to refine the naquadah ore into a useful power source. You've...I must say that you have given me even more effort than I asked for, or expected." He watched Rodney's eyes linger on his work-leathered hand, and felt his affection for the recalcitrant scientist growing even deeper. "You've surprised me, Rodney."

"Have I?" Rodney said but kept his eyes down, faking a smile, trying to recall the way John did it; that loose, disarming smile he would throw casually around that made people like and trust him instantly, and put most females on their backs in under a minute.

"If you let me, Rodney, I can make you happy. I...I _want_ to, you know. I want that for you."

If the man was lying, it was convincing as hell. Rodney looked up at him, and then placed his own hand over Kolya's, not sure why he did it; reflex maybe, but if it fooled the man, so much the better. He nodded; hoping he appeared resigned but not too resigned. Capitulate too much, too soon and Kolya would see right through it. "I know." Maybe it was true. Maybe in his own twisted, slightly sadistic and controlling way, Kolya loved him, or at least thought he did.

But for an answer, because he had to say something, Rodney decided for a little truth, to better set the tone for the weeks ahead. "Hard to argue with happy." He looked away to the mantle, the next admission, however truthful, even saying it now as part of a ruse against this man he hated, was one that still stung the deepest parts of him. An admission of truth that he had not shared with many people. "I haven't had a lot of that."

"I think, in time," Kolya said "you may even grow to care about my happiness as well. Perhaps even care for me."

Yup. The big, murdering bastard was in love. Rodney couldn't find it in himself to say anything back. Not a damn thing.

Because the feeling was sure as hell not mutual.

XXX

"What do you mean you don't want any more cakes?" Rodney asked Barrod openly one day in front of - not Kolya Barrod was glad to note - but two of the other guards who appeared to have nothing better to do than loiter near the Genii commander's quarters. Kolya had been gone for five days and Rodney had to make this happen sooner than later.

"You_ love_ those cakes." Rodney accused. "Even more than I do."

Barrod dared stand next to Acustus's chosen breeder. He spoke in a fierce whisper, terrified of being overheard by the others, making it for the human's ears only. "Well, not anymore. Are you insane? You can't go see Dex on your _own_. I'd be shot. What you want is impossible."

"Nothing's impossible if you want it badly enough." A stupid sentiment but if it worked on the young Barrod... "And it won't be on my own, I'll be with you. I only need an hour or so alone with him. Please?"

"This is crazy, Rodney."

A while back, Rodney had insisted on Barrod calling him by his first name. It made for better relations. It built trust and that's what Rodney needed from the kid – trust. He was a Genii but he was a decent young man who was living in a hard situation.

"No way Rodney am I going to let you go see a slave worker by yourself, much less set up a private meeting between you two. What the hell do you need to see him for anyway?"

A fair question, Rodney knew, but one he was not prepared to answer truthfully. "I need to speak to him, at length, alone, without anyone staring over our shoulders."

"And I'd like to see my thirtieth year, so the answer is no."

Rodney hated to do it, he was a nice kid, but Barrod was giving him no choice. 'Fine. I'll make sure not to tell Kolya that you've been making advances toward me."

Barrod frowned. "Advances..?"

Right, Rodney realised, it was strictly a human euphemism. "_Sexual_ advances; _physical_ overtures; making passes at me; wanting to get into my pants - get it?"

Barrod took a quick step back. "But it isn't true. It's a _lie_."

"Right, so I_ won't_ tell him that lie...as long as I get to see my friend tonight for at least an hour or more - _alone_ - with no prying eyes."

Barrod pursed his lips. "You wouldn't do that to me. I've never hurt you."

"And I don't want to hurt you either but I need to see him and you leave me no choice. If you let me do this, I promise I will never tell Kolya you let me have this meeting." Rodney said, trying not to sound as desperate as he felt. "And that isn't a lie – it's a promise. And you get all my cakes from now on, for as long as they last." He hadn't lied about that, he _was_ sick of them. Besides Kolya would make his baker mix him up something else.

Barrod sighed and Rodney knew that it was the first sign that the kid would eventually give in. He picked up a small jar of oil he'd saved from one of Kolya's elaborate bath nights. "The sooner we go, the sooner we get back."

XXX

"Where can we go?" Rodney asked.

Barrod had made his reasons known to the other guards and led Ronan and him to a secluded corner of the storage halls, where it was quiet and dark. "I'll be at the end of the hall." (A good fifty yards away) Barrod threw them both a warning look. "You have one hour."

"Over here." Ronan led him to a cleft in the grain stacks, one where a good portion of the fifty pound loads had been either moved or shoved aside. "Not that comfortable." He muttered, almost in apology for the accommodations.

Rodney shook his head, unwilling to meet Ronan's eyes. "Doesn't matter." Then he did. "Uh thank you for doing this."

Ronan sat down and pulled him down beside him. "This isn't a _sacrifice_ I'm making McKay." Because the scientist still looked unsure without warning Ronan kissed him on the lips again, working his mouth open with little tongue movements. Then he let him go and said "I _want_ to do this."

"Yeah, okay."

Ronan shook his head at the other man's continued uncertainty. Not knowing how to convince him otherwise, he stood and peeled off his shirt and pants in about six seconds. "I have to warn you," he said "I'm a little bigger than average."

Rodney couldn't help staring at the large half-hard organ dangling in front of his face. "Yeah, I see that."

"But I promise I'll be careful." He took Rodney's chin in hand, forcing him to look eye to eye. "Rodney - this _won't_ hurt. I'll make sure of that."

Rodney looked elsewhere and swallowed because his throat was suddenly dry. "Sh-sure, o-okay."

Because it appeared Rodney was too nervous to do it himself Ronan reached down and began to unbutton the man's shirt.

"Wait." Rodney fished something from a side pocket and put it in Ronan's large palm. "For you. F-for us - it's lube."

Ronan nodded, set it aside and decided to take the next steps as slowly as time allowed. Pushing it off Rodney's shoulders he was amused to see the swift goose-fleshing of his pale skin. "Cold?" He asked, working on unzipping the fly of Rodney's pants.

"More like terrified actually." But he let the big man slip his legs out of the pants one at a time. Ronan ran his hands down the insides of Rodney's thigh. "You've got good legs Rodney."

"Thanks. They're my mother's." At Ronan's frown he added "She was a powerful lady. Rode horses and stuff."

"You didn't ride horses?"

"Too allergic."

Ronan frowned at the weird childhood that had been Rodney McKay: all brains and stuffed up nostrils. And at the present he also had no idea what it must be like for the smaller man, his body altered beyond his control, his whole life changed in the blink of an eye, his future uncertain, and now about to become something else again, about to conceive and carry a _life_, about to carry the life of what would become _their_ child.

It was difficult to wrap his head around but Ronan was certain of one thing: this at least, who Rodney chose to share his life-making body with, _this_ had come by choice. Ronan felt a powerful surge of protectiveness for Rodney swarm through his mind, infusing the cells of his body with emotion and for the need to keep him safe. _His_ mate. His mate whom he was about to make pregnant with their _child!_ He knew he would protect Rodney with his life _for_ life; he would kill for him. Absolutely. He would help him bring that life into the world and destroy any who stood in his path. Their child. _Gods!_ Suddenly he also knew he loved this man. How could he not? How could he _not!?_ "Rodney..."

Rodney's own fear forgotten, he stared up at the tall Satedan. "You've never called me Rodney before. I mean, until just recently."

Ronan shrugged, not allowing the storm of emotions to show, forcing the overpowering need to shoot his way out of their Genii prison recede into the background of his warring desires. For now. "Just seems right." His tone was calm and the words came easy and Rodney would think them very Ronan-like. "We're about to have sex." He had wanted to say _make love_ but he did not want to frighten Rodney off. Did_ not_ want Little Man to change his mind.

"There is _that_."

Ronan could hear the "is that the only reason" behind the comment and sighed. For all his angry bluster, when it came to his own feelings McKay had always been see-through. Ronan crouched down to better facilitate the slipping off of Rodney's socks, Rodney helping by lifting his feet one at a time. "You drive me nuts McKay, but I like you. Always have. Maybe not like this, but now it _is _like this. Believe me or don't. It's up to you." That seemed to settle the scientist a bit, center him maybe.

"You always talk straight to people, Ronan." Rodney said his tone one of simple gratitude. "It's a good quality." When next Rodney looked down he realised he was naked. The air around them was on the cool side, but he knew that would become less important in the next twenty minutes or so. "Just for the record, I liked you too - I mean after I got over, you know, being _terrified_ of you of course."

Ronan smirked at that, remembering the first mission with the astrophysicist, and how Rodney tried to avoid being anywhere near him and where Ronan in contrast had then made a point of trying to be next to McKay whenever possible. Anyway Sheppard had made it clear that although Rodney was a good shot, he was not a trained soldier and therefore more than anyone else on the team needed his back watched. Like a good warrior Ronan had obliged his commander but never-the-less was amused by McKay's flinching whenever he strayed too close to the scientist's flank.

And then in one combat situation after another, where the fear in McKay's eyes was present, there existed also iron beneath the exterior, and the courage to do almost anything to survive, or even die trying to save others. Ronan had swiftly come to see that though McKay was not a soldier, neither was he any coward.

Ronan spent a moment laying out their shirts and pants on the grain sacks to minimise any discomfort they were sure to experience in such a setting. Rodney watched him making their so-called bed and muttered. "I'm going to get a rash for sure." And then looked up at him. "Uh, look, basically I'm too nervous to make the first move, so you're going have to –"

Ronan had figured as much and took Rodney by the shoulders; laying him down on the uneven surface and helping him scoot on his backside further up into the cleft between the sacks of grain, farther into the darkness, where they could have at least some semblance of privacy.

Ronan settled himself in between Rodney's legs, being careful not to squish or pinch any vital parts as he lifted the smaller man's knee's up and apart. Rodney swallowed and Ronan could feel Rodney's fingers lightly, tentatively brushing his back, starting to explore. "I'm sorry I'm not as...hard and toned and-and..."

Rodney's words faltered as his hands swept lower until Ronan felt them grasping the hard muscle of his ass cheeks. Ronan sucked in a breath, and his cock almost instantly hardened again. "Rodney." He said softly to still the man's nervous chatter, his thoughts coming less and less coherent as Rodney's lab-softened fingers marvellously touched this and delightedly felt that. The man didn't know it, but his fingers were just like his brain. They never stopped moving.

"Hmm? What?"

"You're _fine_." Ronan kissed him. "Stop talking now." After some minutes spent making his friend relax more and more Ronan, hardly believing it was happening, slicked up his cock with the faintly scented oil and was finally plunging deep inside the little man beneath him, and it was good...

It was s-o-o-o-o..._good!_

XXX

Eight months. Sheppard's fists never let up against the hard, leathery sides of the bag. It'd had been eight months and no word of the fate of his team mates. He was thankful at least that Rodney had Ronan Dex at his side to see the scientist safely through whatever horrors they might be enduring where ever it was they were. Ronan was one of the strongest, most skillful fighters Sheppard had ever known and he knew Ronan would protect Rodney at all costs. He'd be right there next to him all the way.

If anyone could help Rodney out in a tight spot, it was Ronan Dex.

XXX

Part 6... As soon as I am able.


	6. Chapter 6

A Habit of Force Part 6

G.E. Waldo

XXX

Rodney could feel the big man's body shudder as he came, releasing the fluid deep into his body. Ronan sighed, collapsing on him, panting for a few seconds until Rodney tapped him on the back. The Satedan's warm flesh was moist beneath his fingers and the man's weight on his pelvis was not..._un_comfortable.

His friend's breath against his neck sent shivers down his flesh.

"We only have fifteen minutes left." Rodney said, wishing it were more. Wishing they were anywhere else. But he appreciated the small taste of home - and of freedom - he had just savored in Ronan's urgent but gentle touch and the faint outdoorsy scent from his hair. He never realised it before - hell he never even _thought _about it before - but Ronan's mass of tangled barely under control dreads were so...so _soft!_

Before Rodney started to wheeze from his weight, Ronan lifted himself off, resting on his elbows. He looked down at his friend bemusedly. "Fifteen huh? Time enough for another round." He whispered, delighting in the surprise it elicited on the smaller man's fine-boned features.

"Anoth...you mean you want...I thought...you-you want to...?"

"Yeah." Ronan's generous mouth glommed onto Rodney's lips and he stole a deep, tongue-invading kiss. He stopped the kiss and whispered "Yeah, I want to fuck you again. Why do you look surprised?"

"Uh, no, not surprised, I just never..."

"Never what - thought I wanted to?" He shook his head. "It's no_ favor_, Rodney. Why don't you believe me?"

"I'm not...I don't know, but..."

"But what?"

Rodney's round eyes grew rounder and wider when the thought that had, up until now, lay obscured in only words and intentions, now suddenly hauled back and kicked him with a hard reality. "I'm-I'm...going to get_ pregnant_." Now he sounded scared. Terrified even. "I am, aren't I? I really going to get _pregnant_ – _Jesus!_ – pregnant _here_ – here in this underground bunker decorated in Contemporary Nazi run by a sociopathic, over-sexed _despot_. I'm going to have – my_ God!_ - I'm going to have to raise a baby in a prison. I'm going to have to give_ birth_ in a freaking prison." When all the potential consequences hit him, it hit him full force and Rodney began to struggle in earnest beneath him, trying to twist his body away in the confined spacing between the grain sacks. Ronan meanwhile tried to reason with him in rapid whispers next to his left ear, but Rodney was having none of it and the look on his face convinced Ronan that McKay was temporarily beyond reason.

So, hating to do it, he clamped one large paw over the scientist's mouth to still him and spoke fiercely again. "Rodney – we will _not _be raising this baby here. I promise you that." He stared into Rodney eyes until it seemed like the scientist had gathered a few wits about him once more. "So are you going to squirm and make noise some more, and _attract the guard?"_

At Rodney's cooperative head-shake, Ronan released his mouth. The smaller man was still shaking, and still breathing much too quickly, but his momentary emotional crisis seemed to have passed for now.

Frowning Rodney swallowed his fear - still there lurking at the door but knocking with less vigor - and said "You can't possibly promise that – how could you even thin – uh...hang on...d-did you say _we_?"

Ronan nodded. "It'll be my baby too."

Rodney stared up at him, his blue eyes shining in the darkness, full of uncertainty, fear, and now, perhaps some small particle of comfort. "Yes. I guess it will be."

"He." Ronan smiled. "_He_ will be."

"Now that you _don't _know. Besides what if _it's_ a girl?"

"Then we'll name her Ronanna or maybe Meredith."

"Not a chance in hell for either option."

"Either way, he or she will have your brains and my looks."

Rodney frowned again. "_I_ have looks, too."

Ronan smiled. "Yeah, you do." Rodney still seemed puzzled by something. "What is it?"

"How can you be ready again so _fast_? We just finished."

Ronan shrugged, and then smiled down at his mate mysteriously. "I'm _Satedan_." As though that were all the explanation needed. Then he pushed his once again hard cock against the soft skin of Rodney's inner thigh until he heard Rodney suck in a sharp breath. "You look good down there especially. Now be quite-_er_."

"Very funny."

Then Ronan spent thirteen of the remaining fifteen minutes pounding into his sexual mate with the same level of enthusiasm that he displayed whenever killing a Wraith.

When Rodney's inhibitions finally let go and he moaned softly in the Satedan's ear, only then was Ronan satisfied. And while they were cleaning themselves off and getting dressed, Ronan made a silent vow to his new mate and to his soon to be born child; they would be returned to Atlantis, even if it meant killing every last Genii in the compound.

Especially Acustus Kolya.

XXX

"Barrod tells me you have not participated in any of the preparation rituals as you promised to do." Kolya said over dinner. "None of the bathing or even the physical meditations."

Rodney ground his teeth at the words. 'Physical meditations' was Genii for stretching exercises designed to enhance bodily positions during the sex act. It was meant for the lesser of the mates to do – lesser meaning weaker or subordinate – another Genii peculiarity as people among the Genii did not marry their equals; a Genii marriage was not a partnership based on love but a contract based on social status (or lack there-of), or upon military standing, one partner always taking the dominate role and deciding where to live, how many offspring and who took the lead in when and how to have sex, and the other going along with it. The other being second class mate, the sex-ready creature, the lesser of the two who was expected to sexually perform under demand.

Rodney had no illusions what his position would be with Kolya. Not caring whether the Genii leader heard him or not he muttered "I'm back in the goddamn middle ages. It's hard to believe your people made it _this_ far."

"And yet you will live here, with me, for the rest of your life. After dinner Barrod and another servant will take you to the bathing chambers and you _will_ go through the preparations for tomorrow night."

"_Tomorrow_ night?" Rodney swallowed hard. _Shit! _"You said you would give me another week."

"And you said you were trying." Acustus reminded him. "Clearly that was a lie. Tomorrow you will be bred and you will give me a child, the first of many."

Though he knew it made him sound scared, he couldn't help but ask "H-how many?"

"_Many_." Acustus smiled a little, enjoying the other man squirm. "We Genii have lost many people. We are fewer than we used to be. You and I will make lots of children together Rodney, as many as you are able to bear for as many years as you are my mate."

At the dire pronouncement Rodney lifted his chin in defiance and even Kolya could see it was a weak gesture; bravado of the last resort. "Well, I _refuse_."

Acustus sighed wearily. "But you will comply anyway." Kolya wiped his mouth and laid aside his napkin. He stood and walked to his captive's side of the table, taking his chin in one hand, his fingers surprisingly gently. "I will make it pleasurable for you Rodney McKay, unless of course you fight me," He sighed, "which would make it much _less_ pleasurable for you."

Rodney didn't miss the implication. _Rape_, in other words. "You won't get away with this."

Kolya laughed softly and bent over reaching until his mouth touched Rodney's, taking a kiss from the small human without permission. When he let go he said with all the assurance of a man who always took what he wanted, how he wanted it and when he wanted it. "I already have."

With disgust Rodney suddenly drew his lips away, his mind and body at once filled to the rim with the unwanted invading hands and the slimy mouth of a man he loathed, hating this, hating Kolya, hating the Genii, and hating this place. But most of all hating himself for not spending every minute since his capture trying to escape. And also for not killing Kolya in his sleep the first night the Genii commander casually presumed to share a bed with him, even if all they did was sleep. Even that had felt like an invasion.

"Get off me!" Rodney stood up, shaking - and a bit startled at his own fury. He knew he had a temper but in the past it had always confined itself to yelling at his computers or at his frustratingly slow underlings when they couldn't comprehend a formula he had spent only minutes figuring out. Without another second of thought, Rodney drew back his hand and struck Kolya a blow to his cheekbone. It glanced off, the man was seemingly made of stone – but it left a mark, the reddish blush impact of flesh on flesh. As punches went, it had not been impressive, but still it had felt good.

Until he returned to his senses and realised what he had done. Kolya was not a man to take such actions lightly and before he could duck, the tall Genii backhanded him across the face, sending him sprawling to the floor, this strike far more powerful with all the killer's own strength, anger and restrained lust behind it.

Rodney's face stung, then burned with shame at his pathetic show of resistance and his failure. He dared not rise before permission was given, or he knew more hard fists would result.

Kolya took a step back, steeple-ing his hands to his mouth and taking a few seconds to calm himself. He breathed in slowly and then exhaled, the nostrils flaring. Despite his air of calm, his voice shook, low and threatening. "I can forgive such a display only once, Doctor." Kolya gathered his self control back into its steel prison. "If you give me your word you will not try that again, I promise I won't hurt you again. I regret it, Rodney, when you make me hurt you."

_Classic control-freak spunk. _Rodney thought. "Yeah, right."

Not waiting for a promise, the Genii leader turned his back on his prisoner.

When Kolya had gone, locking the door behind him, Rodney got to his feet and stared dubiously at his forgotten dinner. Kolya had left it for him. At any other time Rodney imagined that the commander would have had it removed as further punishment, but now, with potential baby Nazi's swimming around his crazy head, Kolya had left it behind.

Rodney's stomach churned over the few bites of food he had eaten before the fists had intruded upon the evening. "Yeah, can't have the rape-ee going hungry, can we?" But Rodney ignored the food, too. He had lost his appetite.

XXX

"The Commander wants this receiver repaired today." Barrod explained. "I guess the search team is having difficulty with the incoming signals. They can't distinguish background noise from Wraith chatter."

Rodney looked with mild amusement at the primitive assortment of generators, wires and the computer display. "Not exactly hard to imagine with equipment this crappy." He said. "Are they sure the dish is okay? No birds making nests in it or anything?"

Barrod was used to his charge's dour attitude. "Yes, they're sure. They've already checked it and they're sure it's something with the ground station."

"Right." Rodney ran a quick diagnostic while he spoke to Barrod over his shoulder. "You realise if I'd been called in sooner, this would already be fixed? I could have upgraded the coding weeks ago."

Barrod shrugged. "Kolya didn't trust you then."

"He doesn't trust me _now_." Rodney reminded him. "He's as paranoid as they come."

"You better not let him hear you say that." Barrod shook his head. "He will treat you fine, you know if you stop fighting him. He's not as bad as he seems."

"Oh I dunno', he seems pretty nuts to me. The last time we met, he cut my arm."

"You were an enemy then. It's different now."

"You mean _I'm_ different." Rodney answered. "He can get kids outta' me. That's the only reason he hasn't killed me."

"You're wrong. You should feel honored. Out of all the men from Atlantis he could have taken, he chose you."

"Well, I'm _not_ honored to become Kolya's main - _involuntary_ I might add - fuck. He chose me because I was the only so-called 'Altered' aboard the Jumper."

"Aboard the what?"

"The ship, the shuttle the Genii attacked. Don't you keep up on departmental memos?"

"I don't get out much. We can't all have the kind of freedom you Atlantians take for granted."

"I've been a prisoner here for months, I assure you freedom is not something I take for granted – trust me on that."

Barrod wasn't supposed to say but if it made the human feel better, then things between him and commander might smooth out a little, and that would make all their lives easier. "It wasn't because of the Jumper ship."

But Rodney has his mind on his work now and, irritated at the younger man's continued babble, snapped "What?"

"The ship you came on. It wasn't a coincidence or anything. The commander had his crews scan for you – _specifically_."

Rodney frowned but kept his fingers moving on the keyboard. "What are you talking about?" For one thing, he was sure Genii ships – even the ones they'd salvaged - did not have that ability. On the other hand, they had captured Rodney via a transport beam. So their newer ship or ships had no doubt been "borrowed" from another race – a more advanced one – the Asgaard maybe.

"Acustus didn't want just any breeder, Doctor McKay, he wanted _you_."

Rodney's fingers stopped. "_Why_ me?"

Barrod shrugged again and it was just one of the younger man's mannerisms that irked McKay. He hated it when people spoke with their shoulders. "You know gestures are fine, words are _better_."

Barrod ignored McKay's mocking tone. "The commander didn't exactly give us the whole story, but I think he...admired you, in a way."

"Hah." Rodney went back to his work. "I'll bet."

"He did. He told me so. He liked your strength. 'Said he was surprised by it. Not by the bit with the knife, he knew you wouldn't hold up to pain, but because of what else you did, afterward. You never let up trying to beat him, to stand up to him. He admires that."

"He told you a lot for not telling you a lot."

"It's true."

"Well, goodie for me. Things have worked out real well." But it did tell him something new. Kolya had a weakness and that weakness was himself. Maybe he could use that to his advantage somehow. If he could just figure out the _somehow_.

Barrod said "You won't tell him I told you that will you?"

"Have I ever broken a confidence between us?"

"Not yet, but I know you hate it here, and – what's wrong?"

Rodney was leaning forward, his hand on his forehead. "I don't know. I don't feel well; I guess I should have eaten breakfast."

Barrod looked around. "You're supposed to eat breakfast, Doctor McKay, or you could get sick again."

"Well, I don't want to have to go all the way back to my quarters for a sandwich – is there anything you can grab for me? Like maybe a glass of milk or something?"

"_Milk_? Only baby sheep drink milk, Doctor. I don't know how you humans can stand the stuff."

"How about some soup then? A cup of soup? That should hold me until lunch."

Barrod looked uneasy. "Mmm...I'm not sure I should leave you alone."

"It'll only take you a minute and where am I going to go? There are people all around here, I can't exactly escape when I'm surrounded, can I?"

"You give me your word you won't try to escape?"

"_Yes_, I give you my word, now will you please get me a cup of soup? I need to finish this or his Royal Pain-in-the-Ass-ness will be pissed."

Barrod slung his weapon and pointed a finger at his argumentative charge. "Okay, I'll be back in five minutes. Don't _move_ from that chair."

Rodney gave him a mock boy-scout salute "Oh yes-sir, sir."

Once Barrod was gone from sight, Rodney bent over the - by Atlantis'-standards - primitive computer. No, he would not try to escape, but with no one looking over his shoulder for the next five minutes he would be able to make enough alterations to one of the sub-programs so that rescue might come soon enough. "Thank god for the young and naive."

XXX

Kolya stood naked before him, and he, still in full clothing, stood as far away from the Genii commander as physically possible without seeping into the surrounding plaster. This day had arrived too fast, too soon. There was no way he was ready. There was no way he would ever be able to willingly submit his body to a man who had killed his fellow Atlantians and cut his arm, who had threatened their beautiful Elizabeth, tried to take their city and murder those who got in his way. It was ridiculous – impossible – horrible – _unthinkable!_ "I'm n-not ready. You have to give me more time."

Already, after only three weeks since he and Ronan had slept together in that hour, that one comforting, memorable hour, he could feel the life inside him beginning. It was early, still very early, but he knew it, he could feel it, sense the child starting to grow, and feel the changes deep in his abdomen. He was carrying Ronan's child, and now Kolya wanted to plant his own. It was too late of course. Once you already had a resident, no other renters were allowed. Kind of the like Atlantis' Stargate when the shield was up - _Sorry – we're closed!_

But Rodney had a feeling Kolya was going to tolerate no more delays and Kolya never took his eyes off him. Rodney felt like he was going to throw up. "Please?" Maybe if he was nice. "Please, can I have a few more days?"

Kolya merely shook his head. "Perhaps it will not be as bad as you imagine, Rodney. I can be a tender lover, or so I have been told."

By who – Genghis Kahn? He wanted to snarl but wisely refrained. "I'm not feeling well." He said lamely as Kolya slowly approached him from across the room, taking his time like a hungry mountain lion after a long chase who knew his prey had nowhere to go now, trapped against the cliff face with walls on all sides. The vulnerable creature. His victim. The flesh that would slake the silent but growing keening of his appetite.

After what seemed like not long enough, Kolya reached Rodney and rested his hands on the physicist's tense shoulders. "No more delays." He actually smiled, almost a full grin. "If you would only relax and let me show you how pleasurable it can be..."

"You have quite an opinion of yourself, don't you?" Rodney said with contempt but his heart was in his throat.

"No more than you, Rodney McKay." He whispered and then his mouth found his prisoner's once more and this time he did not end the kiss or step away or any of the other small reprieves Rodney had been granted in the past. This time, the Genii's hands were on his shirt and then swiftly beneath it, tickling his ribcage with his fingers and grasping he buttons of his shirt, undoing them one at a time.

Rodney tried to stay as still as possible, not to encourage the man's presumptuous hands by squirming to the left or the right. But it was impossible to enjoy this. When Kolya began to pull at the buttons more urgently, Rodney began to struggle in earnest, turning his face to one side to avoid any more of the man's sour salvia or grossly probing tongue.

But instead of discouraging Kolya, it seemed to spurn him on and the bigger man smiled behind his sucking lips that then adhered themselves to Rodney's neck like a sucker fish, his teeth taking tiny nips here and there. Rodney felt like he was being eaten alive one small nibble at a time.

Finally he couldn't stand it anymore and began to thrash and kick at Kolya, flailing useless fists against the larger man's taut chest muscles, and kicking feebly at the man's thick shins. This elicited nothing more than a chuckle of delight from Kolya, who clamped iron fingers around Rodney wrists, pushing him down to his knees and then onto the floor, pinning him to the unpolished ceramic plates with his heavier body and tearing at his remaining clothes until they were rags. Then ripping at the shreds, he pulled the last threads of them from his body until Rodney was nude and shivering on the hard surface. The roughness beneath his back scraped his skin. He imagined the tiny cuts that it would leave behind.

"Let me go, you bastard!"

But Kolya just laughed as he took hold of Rodney's throat with his right hand and forced one of Rodney's legs up with his left, all the while his movements becoming more frantic, more and more excited.

Rodney's hands were around Kolya's tree-like limbs, grappled uselessly. He then froze at the sight of the man's thick cock, bobbing in the chilled air, a huge organ with its purple mushroom shaped head lying against his stomach, almost reaching his navel, and weeping with pre-cum, ready, it seemed, to plunge into him and complete the sexual assault that Kola's hands had fashioned ready for it.

Rodney felt the panic rise in his chest and fought the man's superior strength until he was gagging under the squeezing fingers. Every few seconds Kolya would loosen his fingers from around his throat; just enough to let a trickle of air into Rodney's lungs before they burst, and then tighten it again when it seemed like the scientist's energy to fight had resurfaced.

Rodney sucked in a breath and coughed while Kolya's positioned himself above his anus and slicked his penis with saliva. It seemed unreal what was happening. It was all a terrible mistake; he shouldn't be here in this awful place. Kolya had taken the wrong man. He _must_ have. No one raped Rodney McKay, no one even _wanted_ Rodney McKay so why in the hell should anyone want to rape him? It didn't make _sense_. None of it made any sense at all.

Suddenly a sensation ripped through him, nearly making him scream, as Kolya's engorged cock was shoved - without warning or sufficient preparation - passed his sphincter and deep into his body.

Deaf to the cries of his victim, Kolya's body suddenly went still.

And then he let out a long exhale of pure pleasure. "O-h-h-h-h I knew you'd be worth the wait." He whispered into his captive's ear and then withdrew his cock, giving Rodney two seconds of relief before he shoved it back inside with all the demands of his pent up lust, each time drawing in a sharp breath, then exhaling as though he were consuming the best gourmet food in the galaxy, savoring each bite and then moaning with obscene enjoyment. Then he began to thrust and thrust, his foul breath next to Rodney's ear, the hated Genii's spit spraying his cheek with every gasp, faster and faster, pumping like mad until his body stiffened and shuddered in triumph, pouring his enemy worms into his victim's body.

Rodney kept his eyes closed through the entire ordeal and then went limp as the pain of his torn insides burned hot and long even after Kolya let his throat go, withdrew his softening member and sat up. Rodney was grateful the suffocating weight upon his chest was gone but he had given up the fight many moments before. The sickening deed had been done after all. What was the use in resisting now?

He was hardly aware when Kolya, now spent, clamored off him, calling for Barrod to come an attend to his rape victim, though Kolya had used the word "mate", which made Rodney laugh a little insanely to himself.

He was numb. He felt hollowed out. Soul-gouged. Empty, though pain was there to fill him somewhat, crowding into the hollow spaces between his self and his former self. And loneliness came along for the amusement, with shame tagging along behind; all the emotions a prisoner feels when they've been promised one thing and then instead ill-used; when the despicable have finished their wicked deeds against them; when the light of hope dims. But mostly he felt like a person who had been used to wipe up another's waste and then thrown in the garbage.

Someone had blown his nose into Rodney's soul and then tossed him in the trash.

XXX

Barrod bathed away the blood and the slime of Kolya's attack, and Rodney was grateful for it. Barrod did not try to get him to open his eyes or even acknowledge Rodney was even there sitting in the cooling water, naked as the day he was born, while another man washed his bruises and cleaned the grit from his scrapes. Barrod didn't even flinch when the moment came where he had to reach between Rodney's legs, spread his ass-cheeks and very tenderly wiped away the blood and the evidence of his brutal attack.

Rodney was thankful for that. He had been touched enough for one day, but at least Barrod had asked permission – once Kolya had barked his orders and left the room. The young servant-man had bent down and whispered to him. "I'm here to help you, Doctor McKay, if that's all right. May I help you?"

And when Rodney had nodded, Barrod, sounding a little shy and embarrassed, added "It means I have to touch you, okay?"

It had turned out to be all right, as Barrod had a gentle hand and an understanding touch. Rodney wondered if Kolya had used _him_ in the past and had Barrod taken a similar type of bath afterward. Rodney imagined a slew of people over the years having taken such baths to wash away the stain that was Acustus Kolya.

"He doesn't mean to be like that, you know. It's just...you resisted. You fought him. If you wouldn't, then..."

"No difference." Rodney said quietly, almost in a whisper. His throat was still sore from Kolya's cruel hand. "Men like him...no difference." Men like him were plenty in this life. Plenty. Why couldn't have Sheppard's bullet struck the bastard through the heart? Why did so many pricks like Kolya survive to adulthood? The odds were however (his mathematical mind reminded him); the same each time the coin was tossed. Each child had the potential to turn out a rapist or a murderer. Most, thank god, did not. Pegasus seemed to have gotten its fair share of assholes though, he supposed. No more, no less than home.

"Men like him never ask." Rodney said, and then went quiet, licking his lips. What he wouldn't give for a hot chocolate with Kahlua in it. He sat up and looked at Barrod. Nice kid. He had one friend here, at least, other than Ronan. "You wouldn't have any liquor around here, would you?"

XXX

Sheppard turned from his stomach onto his back, sleep eluding him. Most nights were like this now. Months after Ronan and Rodney had been taken from them sleep and he had become bitter enemies. His thoughts turned constantly to his last view of Rodney, staring at him from behind the shrieking light display of the foreign transporter, his blue eyes wide with fear and looking to his colonel for help.

Ronan had been the one to respond, to leap to Rodney's aid, however futilely, while Sheppard had only stared in shock as both men had then disappeared from sight.

Tonight his thoughts turned to Rodney and, whenever they did, his cock twitched with the memories of the scientist's flesh standing so close to him during missions, during breaks, during television watching...ever unconscious and unaware that Sheppard's body ached to touch him, press against him, clutch at him desperately.

In many dreams his cock hardened with the anticipation of entering Rodney, fucking him slowly and with such tenderness he knew Rodney would never, ever leave his bed again. Rodney would even touch him back and kiss him with an open, eager mouth. Then he would moan in his ear their mutual pleasures and sigh at the physical delights Sheppard would bring to him every night of their life. Sheppard would give back by kissing and licking his sweet belly as it began to grow with the child inside it, the one that he planted in their many love-making sessions, each one hotter than the last. The sweet, round under-belly, warm under his hand, tight with life and love and always _wanting_ John...

Sheppard felt his body shiver with secret delight as his fluid spilled over his hand. He lay back, feeling guilt and shame for using Rodney's memory for his selfish need. But sleep eluded him now. He couldn't eat or hardly even think straight for missing the frustrating physicist and he knew his own duties were suffering because of it. The days went by with him snapping at everyone. Even Zelenka, a man who had developed an impressively thick skin after so many years working with McKay, was now avoiding his acid tongue. Sheppard wondered if maybe he was sick.

Giving up on shut-eye, he slipped on a pair of jeans and a sweat-stained tee-shirt and made his way to the infirmary wondering where the hell he thought he was going as Becket was most likely in bed. Sheppard wasn't too surprised to find the man bent over his electronic note-book, though, as the doctor raised his head as Sheppard entered.

"Colonel. Can't sleep?"

"No." He said, easing his tired bones into a stiff chair. All medical bays had horrid chairs. Doctors were supposed to help people, not torture their ass-bones. "Keep thinking about Rodney and Ronan."

"Aye. Me too."

Suddenly Sheppard was curious about something. Beckett had spent as much time around Rodney as any of them, since Rodney was his most frequent patient. The scientist got himself wounded almost every mission in one form or another, most non-life threatening. Some, though, had been frightening. Some had nearly killed him. John tried his best not to think about those times. "Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"Ever get hard over Rodney?" It was too late in the day for delicacy, and he was too exhausted for tact. "Sorry – it's been on my mind lately. Kind of a theme really..."

Beckett's eyebrows came together and at the same time were raised up, giving him a faintly giddy-looking frown. It was an expression Sheppard had never been able to duplicate. He wondered if the doctor practised it in the mirror.

Obviously a bit uncomfortable "Has't now?" Beckett asked.

"Yes. I'm sick over him I think. Or at least _penis_ sick. But you didn't hear it from me."

"Fine. All right."

"This is off the record by the way." Sheppard added and then asked a little anxiously. "It _is_ off the record – right?"

Beckett chuckled and closed his laptop, swivelling his chair to face Sheppard directly. "I'm not taking notes if that's what you're worried about, Colonel."

"John."

"Sorry?"

"It's two AM, we're sharing cock talk about Rodney - I think you can me John."

"Oh, aye. Sure." Beckett cleared his throat rather noisily. Sheppard suspected talking about sex made the Scott a wee bit uncomfortable. But the doctor plunged in anyway. "Um, to answer your rather bold question, yes, I have thought about Rodney. Me and Rodney _together_ - if ya' get my drift, mind ya' I didn't ever _act _on it..."

"You just _thought _about it."

"Aye."

"A lot?"

"Aye, a lot. It's become a bit of a thorn actually."

"Me too, thought about it I mean. A lot. In the shower, in my rooms, in bed..."

"Oh – ahem – I think I understand."

"Why didn't you? Ever _act_ on it?"

"A number of reasons but mostly because I've seen Rodney bleeding out on my table, shot, poisoned, his brain dying, I've treated him in the midst of a serious allergic reaction...I've seen every square naked inch of him in blood and in pain. And he knows I've seen it all..."

Sheppard frowned at Beckett's long-windedness. "Is there some secondary point you're trying to make?"

"Would you want to date someone when there was already no mystery left?"

Sheppard got it. "But what if you love him?" He suspected he himself did, but for a reason he could not explain even to himself he needed to hear it from someone else whom he knew already cared for the man. He needed back-up, somehow, that what he was feeling was not just good-friend-whom-I'd-also-like-to-bang-every-night feelings. It was fearful, this thing, whatever it was that he was experiencing. It held a powerful sway and presently Rodney wasn't even within shouting distance. What would happen when he was standing next to the man _now? _Whistles? Bells? Or - even _worse_ - if he declared his feelings for the brilliant but nerve shattering little man? Would the heavens crack unilaterally? More probably Rodney would stare at him with incredulity and then call him an idiot.

Of course he cared for Rodney – deeply cared – and yes he wanted to fuck him into the middle of next week. But the very, very last thing he wanted to do was hurt him by presenting something that wasn't actually there. Rodney was no delicate flower when it came to saving the city from a mortal enemy, but when it came to relationships the little guy had a heart made of old, thin china. A stiff _wind_ could crack it.

Sheppard needed to be sure.

"Well, I must admit I do a wee bit already."

That was unexpected. Sheppard felt an immediate jolt of jealousy and surprisingly, at the same time, a bit charmed by the doctor's sentiment. Rodney was worth loving, wasn't he? It – this thing - was not just physical, of that he was more and more certain. Didn't_ he_ already sort of, kinda' already love the guy anyway, _before_ all shit happened? Rodney was his best friend. First person to reach that far into him since...seemed like forever. "Oh. So have you, you know, been '_thinking'_ over him?"

"Er - no."

Now that was surprising. Genuinely curious "Why not?"

Beckett appeared a bit put out. "Well, as I said before, it'd be improper – I couldn't – uh - I'm his _physician _like..."

Oh, right, the doctor bit, professional distance and all that. Plus he'd said he'd seen Rodney naked a lot. Sheppard recalled the flashing eyes of the little physicist as he rushed out of the infirmary that day, ass snuggly nestled in faded jeans, no socks on his feet, and then water and clinging soap and all that lovely, lovely skin...

Beckett was asking something and Sheppard had to drag his mind back to the conversation at hand. "But I take it you-"

Sheppard nodded once. "Yep."

Beckett seemed at a loss to say anymore except a very polite "A-hem."And then he shook his head and smiled wryly. "He is a right little distraction, isn't he?"

Sheppard raised his eyebrows in the affirmative. "You got a pill, doc'?"

Beckett's mouth popped open a bit. "You mean to halt – er – soften yer- um...that is _reduce_..."

Sheppard was lying back in the chair now, with his feet spread out and his chin slouched inside the cup of his right hand "To help me_ sleep_."

"Oh." Becket stood up, the relief on his face that the previous conversation had taken an about-face clear. "Yes, I'll give you a few so you can get back on track."

"Thanks."

Beckett unlocked his little dispensary and counted out a few pills into a blue vial. "We'll get 'em back, Col –er - _John_. You hafta' believe that."

Sheppard said nothing. He took the vial and slipped it into his jeans pocket. "Off the record?"

Beckett nodded. "Aye. As _God_ as my witness it's off the record." He said, then patted Sheppard on the back, steering him away from the subdued lights of the infirmary and into the even softer lights of a sleeping Atlantis. "Get some sleep."

Sheppard stopped. Without looking back at the doctor he said "Do you think someone can die from this?"

"Blue balls? No-no, no one's ev-"

"No, I mean from..._missing_ someone so badly you think you might be going insane. I feel a bit nuts and not just from lack of sleep."

"I'd say you're just physically smitten, John - love-sick they used to call it - though this version seems far more intense and it's happening to many of us. We're living in a new and stranger world. It can cause sleepless nights and a few other odds and ends but, no, no, it won't kill you."

Sheppard nodded. "'night Carson."

"Goodnight my friend. Sleep well."

XXX

Part 7 asap.

*A reader let me know that Ronan is actually spelled Ron_on. _Reader's sharp eyes I ever appreciate! However, just for consistency, I'm leaving it as Ronan, at least for this story, only because I like it better that way – it sounds more correct if you understand me. To my ears Ro'nun _sounds_ more correct than Ro'-nahn (though I have, in this story and that one, seen it spelled with the "a-n" and not the proper "o-n"). So for now it will stay as it is even though the "o-n" is the correct spelling. But still my thanks to a sharp-eyed reader.

Genie


	7. Chapter 7

A Habit of Force Part 7

G.E. Waldo

XXX

Rodney raised his glass when Kolya entered their quarters – he hated thinking of the prison-room as _theirs_ but there was no getting away from it. Kolya slept in the same bed with him every night and every two or three nights seemed intent on nailing him to the mattress with his rudely interfering cock. "Here's to captivity." He slurred.

Barrod had sweetly provided him with a small collection of alcoholic beverages and, at least when his brain wasn't on demand with repairing every breakdown of the Genii's pathetic collection of computers and assorted machines he imbibed the fruity drinks with vigor. "And to my captor." He was drunk and didn't give a shit either.

Kolya frowned, recognising the effects of alcohol over-consumption immediately – a beverage he forbade his soldiers but who never-the-less found ways to brew, hide and then consume it in their off hours. "You're intoxicated."

"Think I'm going to have your baby sober?" _Ronan's baby!_ For which Rodney silently saluted the heavens, but there was no use in continuing trying to conceal the fact he was quite obviously pregnant. It had become evident. His pants were already too tight to do up the top button; a fact he knew Kolya had noted when he had gotten dressed next to him several mornings previous.

Kolya marched over and knocked the glass from his hand and Rodney scolded himself for drinking in front of his jailer. He was still Rodney McKay though and so still insulted. "Hey!" The last of his favorite elixir, a mixture of sweetened grain ale, was now nothing more than an amber-colored puddle on the tiles. "I was drinking that."

Kolya sniffed his mate delicately. "You will refrain from drinking while you are pregnant with my son."

Rodney threw him a scoffing glare. "How the hell do you know it's a son?"

Kolya, annoyed at his mate's continued defiance but pleased at his growing belly. "It is doubtful a girl child would survive; we are all carriers of the virus. A thing the gods know."

"So you believe in gods now, do you?"

An indulgent smirk. "Merely an expression." Kolya turned away to unlace his weapon belt, unloading the bullets and placing them inside a locked metal case, storing both it and his hand gun on a high shelf behind his personal desk. "I am pleased to see your belly growing so well."

Rodney never let up his hateful glare. "That's _one_ of us anyhow."

Kolya walked over to him and without permission lifted his shirt and placed his right palm on the grapefruit-sized distension below his navel. "I do not understand why you cannot be happy about this." Kolya gently chided him as he moved his large paw in slow circles and was slyly pleased to hear the human suck in a quick breath in response. "This will be a beautiful child, Rodney, one we will have created together." Then he kissed him, making his hand-strokes wider, firmer and reaching farther down until his fingers brushed against the man's flaccid penis tucked into the thin material of his pants. "And to me you are beautiful as well." Then he kissed him tenderly on the lips while letting his hand play freely with the smaller man's cock, feeling it grow beneath his fingers.

Still the human did not kiss him back but his penis was clearly enjoying the personal attention. "I love you, Rodney." He whispered and steered him to the bed.

This time hurt, too, but not as much as their previous encounters, and Kolya took the time now to pay attention to his captive's body's particular sexual needs, never letting him out of the bed until he had the stubborn human groaning and thrashing in the throes of an orgasm.

As he lay beside his pregnant mate, Kolya rubbed small circles on Rodney's belly once more, teasing the tiny blondish hairs running in a thin line from below his navel to his groin. "You humans do not have much body hair." He said.

"Shows what you know or rather what you _don't_. _I_ don't have much body hair. Some humans have more, some have a lot." He didn't know why he even bothered to converse with the man. "Some have as much as you, Mister Ape." Kolya himself was a hairy man in possession of a hard, masculine body. There was nothing soft or feminine about Acustus Kolya, a state Rodney didn't know whether he hated or preferred. After a few seconds of debate he decided that because it was _Kolya_ he didn't give a shit.

Kolya frowned at the word _ape_. "What is ape?" He said.

Rodney knew the man did not have a sense of humor but he wasn't going to explain it. "Nothing," Rodney sighed. "It's nothing."

Kolya chuckled. "You are a puzzling human, Rodney McKay."

Rodney rolled away from him and tucked his hands under his head to sleep. "I'm tired. Leave me alone."

Kolya laughed again but instead of complying with his mate's request he wedged one massive forearm beneath Rodney's side just below his rib cage while gently draping the other over Rodney's ever growing belly and settling in for the night. Rodney fell asleep to the sensation of fingers drawing circles on his stomach, tiny kisses along the nape of his neck and many contented sighs of his jailer in his ear.

The sensations were faintly reminiscent of the movements of his cat across the bed covers at night; tiny breaths of a whiskered face against his cheek; the restless feline stepping its soft paws here and there across his skin; unwanted when he had been trying to find slumber but, at the same time, comforting in a weird way. Something familiar and warm – evoking feelings of home and so home-sickness.

Though-out the days Kolya was a bastard but at night Rodney could almost welcome his presence in his bed. Even a sociopath with warm hands was better than the aching loneliness that clutched at him when the lights went out.

XXX

"What is wrong with him?" Kolya demanded of his physician as his human and very pregnant mate threw up his dinner just as he had thrown up his lunch into the shared commode of their quarters.

The physician had been checking his commander's new mate every few hours for going on three days. "I-I'm not certain sir. It must be related to his pregnant state."

Kolya's face darkened. "What do you mean must be? Don't you _know?_ You are the _doctor_."

Doctor Storr swallowed and licked the sweat from his upper lip. "Well, you see, sir, we do not - that is - the Genii have very little practical knowledge of human physiology. We have been able to monitor and treat his odd blood disorder – we don't understand it as yet but we were able to remedy it with regular food intake-"

Already out of patience - "I am aware." Kolya snapped testily and then sneered "Doctor McKay himself was later forced to explain it to you."

"Yes but, but we have never seen a pregnant human before, or been in the position to need to-to _treat_ one never mind a pregnant _male_. This, uh, he, your doctor McKay is the first and we have – er – well, I'm not sure what to do for him." Storr looked nervously over to his retching patient, bent over on the edge of the soft mattress and spilling the contents of his stomach into a tin basin. "None of the Genii life-makers have had this reaction to food. This is the time he should be eating more and feeling well, not...not _this_. Everything seems to make him sick. Eating makes him vomit, _not_ eating makes him vomit. _Water_ even makes him vomit and I am reluctant to administer the pareff as it may interfere with the growth of the baby."

His hands on his hips, Acustus stood tall and glared at his stammering physician with all the good-natured patience of the dictator he was. "This is unacceptable." Kolya announced. "If you do not have the knowledge then you must acquire it."

"But...but _how_ sir? Are we not under strict communications silence? How am I to...um...?"

Kolya scratched his chin, not bothering to agree with the doctor's truthful point. His eyes watched his mate with deep worry. "Leave that to me." He said and then barked into his communicator, a small devise strapped to his right arm that granted internal communications within the complex. "Barrod! Have Fen' and a second guard bring the Satedan worker to my quarters immediately."

His servant's response was swift._ "Yes sir!"_

XX

Ronan was marched before Kolya and, to his immediate concern (though he betray nothing what-so-ever on his face), the appearance of a very sick-looking Rodney McKay that two men were struggling to assist to a cot on wheels.

Ronan realised he was in the Genii leader's personal quarters. Ronan swiftly raked his eyes over the room, his trained warrior senses absorbing everything in it, including the soft, comfortable looking bed – one big enough for two - that stood against one wall some forty feet from where he was standing. He had no illusions as to who might be occupying it or _with _whom. "What?" He said rudely to Kolya while his eyes lusted and his hands ached to kill the man where he stood.

Kolya ignored the obvious hatred emanating from his prisoner. "As you can see, your friend McKay is ill."

"Yeah, I see. 'That _your _fault?"

Kolya's face darkened. "I shall ignore your impudence because the well being of our friend is my first concern. What I need from you is whatever medical knowledge you may possess of him, his human physiology. We need to know what is wrong so we may treat him."

"I'm Satedan." Ronan reminded him."And I'm not a doctor."

"But you have lived for years with them," Kolya countered, "the humans on Atlantis. Surely you picked up some knowledge of their illnesses and common conditions? My physician has proved...inadequate."

"You should have thought of that before you brought him here."

Kolya shrugged. "Unfortunate circumstances... oversight." he said.

"Arrogant and ill-prepared you mean."

Kolya regarded him coolly. "You do not wish to help your friend?"

"Of course I'll help him."

Kolya took a single step forward and suddenly said quietly. "He is pregnant." His eyes drilled into the Satedan's equally dark ones but the man before him did not flinch. "With_ my_ child." Kolya added and then when Ronan did not even blink asked curiously "Does that disturb you?"

"Why should it?" Ronan asked.

Kolya stepped back again, satisfied somehow with the exchange. "Then Barrod and Fen' will escort you and Rodney to our medical bay."

XX

Ronan leaned over McKay and placed one hand on his head. The flesh under his fingers was hot. Obviously he was running a temperature and his breath stunk of grain ale. "Hey. McKay? _Rodney_."

"No touching." Barrod warned and when Ronan turned his head to frown at him he explained with some embarrassment. "Kolya's orders; no touching him."

Ronan felt like starting – and ending - an argument right then and there but wisely took his hand away from McKay's hot forehead. Storr hovered behind him but he obeyed the order, not wanting to bring any harm to McKay if Kolya should chose to punish_ him_ by hurting Rodney.

Ronan asked Storr "Why are standing over my shoulder? Think I'm gonna' to hurt 'im?"

Storr backed off a few meters. Ronan relaxed a bit. What he really wanted to know from the doctor was "How far along is he?" When no one spoke he barked. "The _pregnancy?_ How far along."

Storr was about to answer but Rodney beat him to it, saying in a gravelly voice, his throat sore from repeatedly losing his guts "About three and a half months...I think."

Ronan looked down at him. "I think nausea is normal for a human female around this time." He said mostly to Rodney but if the other's overheard...fine, whatever. The alcohol was probably not a good idea though. He tried to dredge up every scrap of information he had gathered while listening to Beckett rattle on whenever he had found himself in the infirmary with an injury or, more frequently, when Rodney, Sheppard or Teyla had been hurt.

He recalled Teyla's pregnancy and the frequent bouts of nausea she had endured, the physical discomforts of the growing child in her womb, the small complaints of Atlantis's heat and her own gnawing fatigue. But he whispered too softly for anyone but Rodney to hear "Do you think this is that?"

Rodney looked up at him and winked. "Probably." He said aloud and then in a whisper "But I may have been playing it up a bit." Then he smiled, making sure his face was not in line with Barrod or Storr's curious stares from a few feet away.

_Playing it up_ - to get him down here of course. Ronan bit back a laugh and then smiled just a bit, delighted with the little man's ruse. There was no guaranteeing of course that Kolya would have brought him down to see the physicist, but Sheppard's words came to mind: _you never know until you try_. "What do you need?" Ronan asked, correctly guessing that Rodney had wanted to tell him something important.

Rodney glanced in Barrod's and the doctor's direction, making sure neither man's focus was directly on them to the exclusion of all else. "I sent a signal out. It might be strong enough to attract some attention."

Ronan nodded. "Good." But it could attract Wraith attention too. "Risky."

Rodney nodded back. "Yeah, but a simple signal of distress was all I could manage with their lousy equipment." He lowered his voice even more. "And the baby's yours by the way."

Letting his eyes reveal his delight. "I know." He covertly touched the bulge on Rodney's lower abdomen, very briefly, so he could feel for himself the swell of life inside his mate and know it was true. Knowing that Rodney would understand he was referring to their escape - "When the time comes I'll be here. You can count on that."

Rodney glared at him. "Well, _duh._ Of _course_ I'm counting on it - you think I can run anywhere carrying this baby cave-man inside me?"

Ronan nodded to the baby bulge. "Is he healthy?"

"Do I look like Carson? How should I know?" Rodney suddenly looked a bit miserable. "All I know is I feel _fat_."

"But sexy."

Not so miserably "Sexy? You think I'm sexy?"

"Yeah. I want to get you away from here so I can fuck you some more."

"Really?" Rodney whispered, looking like a man who was not sure he believed his ears. "M-_more_?"

"Lots more." Ronan didn't care whether Barrod or Storr saw or not, he leaned in and kissed Rodney tenderly on the lips, lingering for a few seconds and then stood up, turning to look at the Genii servant and the physician, his silence challenging either to say or do anything about it but the young man had the grace to pretend he hadn't seen a thing and the doctor did not seem to care one way or another.

Satisfied that Rodney would be for now safe Ronan vaguely recalled from what seemed like another lifetime a bit of Beckett's soothing and slightly patronising doctor-ly advice to Teyla, ad-libbing the rest. "Keep him away from the ale. Other than that it's normal for humans to throw up a lot when they're pregnant." He announced. "Keep him on soups for today and make sure he rests as much as possible. It'll pass."

Doctor Storr started. "You mean he's been drinking alcohol?"

"If you'd bothered to smell his breath, you'd know." Ronan then shrugged. "Can't say I blame 'im."

Storr looked reproachfully over to Barrod who had the grace to look embarrassed. "You realise," the doctor said addressing his words to the young servant, "that I shall have to report this to the commander? Is there anything else you need to say to me Barrod _before_ I make my report to Kolya?"

His face white "N-no doctor." Barros stuttered and Storr's eyes narrowed, suddenly understanding words not spoken. He sighed, resigned to the guessed-at, uncomfortable truth behind Barrod's poorly executed lie. "I see." Storr said. And then sadly "you _know_ he will find out eventually."

Barrod swallowed, his eyes horrified. "Y-you think so?"

For now forced to ignore the potential and unfortunate trouble the young and foolish Barrod had gotten himself into the doctor focused his attention on his still queasy patient and said to the pregnant McKay with a stern frown "From now-on Alcohol is strictly forbidden."

XXX

"We have a signal sir." Chuck looked up from his readings and said to colonel Sheppard who was standing over his left shoulder, his arms crossed in a casual slouch as Chuck finished one of ten daily Gate sweeps for signals or communiqués for what might turn out to be useful Intel'. "It's coming through the Gate comm. systems but it's weak. Not Asgaard signal, not Genii or anything I recogni – no, _wait!_ – I think it's an SOS. It's a May-Day." He explained and then added unnecessarily "Human."

Sheppard asked "From where?"

"Hard to fix it. It's subspace broadband. Not too far though; a nearby system. Must have taken weeks to reach our Gate."

"That's McKay." Sheppard said, feeling it in his bones. "That has to be them."

Sheppard's very brief elation at finally getting some good news was quickly squelched by his communications man. "There are indications of other signals now from the same corridor. Just give me a few seconds..." Chuck then turned and looked up at his commander gravely. "Wraith. And from the number of mixed signals, probably darts."

"Same system?"

"Most likely sir."

XXX

"You wanted to see me sir?" Barrod stopped just in front of the opened door to Kolya's military office. His feet did not even cross over into the threshold for even an inch. As he was his master's domestic servant Acustus Kolya had never before called him to his military chamber. "Will you be needing your mid-day meal served here sir?" He asked hopefully.

Acustus Kolya did not look up from the report he was reading. "No, Barrod. Please step into the room and close the door."

Barrod, heart in his throat, did what he was told. "Please sit Barrod. You must be fatigued."

Kolya was not a man known for his gentle charms, but he could at times be socially engaging when warranted or, more usually, when he keenly desired to know something. Barrod cleared his throat nervously. "Yes, sir, thank you. Not really tired sir."

Kolya nodded, finally setting aside the report in his hands with a sigh. Foodstuffs and grain production, despite the new laborers, was behind schedule. The weather had not been their friend this summer. "You have served me well for several years Barrod."

"Four years, five months sir, yes sir."

"I value that sort of loyalty. And you have treated my new mate with kindness." He looked at his young servant with shrewd, steady eyes. "That I also appreciate."

"Doctor McKay is a very...interesting human sir and I know how much you value him. I would never do anything to hurt him sir."

"I know you would not." He stood and Barrod's heart began to race. This was also a Kolya tactic, hover over the enemy and, with low steely words, peel away his defenses one thin layer at a time. "I know that you would never bring him any harm...even if you thought you had to lie to do so; to...keep him happy."

"I have never lied to you sir."

But Kolya saw through the half admission. "To keep a truth to oneself is a kind of lie, though. Wouldn't you say Barrod?"

"P-perhaps sir. I'm not s-sure what you mean."

Kolya placed one hand on his underling's left shoulder, making him jump just a little. "I know of your loyalty to me, Barrod;_ that_ is not in question. What is in question is your judgement."

"Oh, I see sir. My j-judgement?" Barrod's face now sported a sheen of sweat and he could not keep his feet still upon the floor. Storr must have guessed and told Kolya_ everything_. His insides clenched with fear. He said softly "I guess... I guess that's...I think I understand sir."

Kolya continued to pace slowly behind him. "I am sure, Barrod, Doctor McKay has been a bit of a trial for you. He is an interesting man. A very interesting man indeed, as you said, and a brilliant one, but he is strong willed, single-minded and as stubborn as a two-horned bush-boar. I fear he is a man used to getting his own way. Do you agree?"

Barrod nodded miserably. "Yes sir. If you say so, sir."

Kolya sat back down and faced his fibbing servant. "The doctor – our doctor - has explained things to me. I know you took it upon yourself to take Doctor McKay to see his friend -"

"I'm _very_ sorry sir, but it was only for an hour. You see he missed him so much and he was so unhappy, plus he...well, threatened me –not physically of course but with...he is so good with words, sir and I...I just didn't know what to do. I like my post. I like serving you, I was afraid to lose it...it's all _my_ fault sir." He finished, his terrified eyes now only on his own writhing hands, his face dripping with the perspiration of fear.

Kolya sat back, holding his breath for just a few seconds as he processed what he had just heard. The end to his question, the one he had been unable to complete due to Barrod's panicked interruption, would have been "the wine-maker." The one who brewed the fine Chakla grain and native fruits into tasty sweet ale's, the man who had been supplying Barrod with drink for Rodney.

Now Kolya's eyes narrowed as he realised to what Barrod was actually referring. A new, very secret knowledge previously hidden away, a truth kept from him. A truth about his mate and his clandestine activities, whenever and with whomever they had taken place. A knowledge even Doctor Storr had not correctly guessed at he now surmised, the physician having said nothing whatever of it to him in his verbal report moments ago, but only that Barrod had been supplying McKay with drink. With _drink_, not with, not with...

_Him._

Kolya bristled at the young man before him. His loyal little servant Barrod had taken the nefarious Doctor McKay to see his Satedan friend behind his very back sometime _prior_ to today's arranged medically-purposed visit by his order.

Instead of backhanding his servant across the room, Kolya managed to control his features and his fists and asked very coolly "I have only one more question before you return to your regular duties Barrod - _When_ did this visit take place?"

Barrod thought for a moment. "Just over three and one half months ago, sir. It was in the middle of the week, after hours, during your absence."

In other words during his two week campaign, _before_ he had become physically intimate with the Atlantean doctor. "Thank you for your honesty Barrod." He would deal with Barrod when the time came. "You may return to my quarters and see to the needs of my mate."

Barrod rose and stammered his vast gratitude, slipping from the room as fast as his feet would carry him, almost weeping with relief.

Saving Barrod's punishment for a later date, after he had some time to think of something appropriate, Kolya meanwhile called for his physician and two orderlies to meet him in his quarters, and then he marched his own way there, fury guiding his steps, his hands fists of iron ready to strike at any who accidentally got in his way, and his heart crushing under the doctor's betrayal, frozen and black with jealousy.

Kolya burst through the doors, his face nearly purple with rage. He thrust one accusing finger at the man he called his mate, barking out an order to the two men who followed him in. "Bind him!"

Rodney stumbled from the bed and his mid-afternoon nap, shaking the cobwebs from his brain as he tried to understand what was going on. He had no time to sort it out before Kolya's two henchmen - though they were dressed as medical orderlies – approached him, seized his hands and began tying his wrists and then his ankles together with rough fibered rope. "Hey? What the hell is going on?" He looked up at the blotchy face of Kolya who was only now standing over him, glaring down with barely controlled rage.

"Kolya? What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"That is _my_ question, Doctor McKay." He hissed, "Not _yours_."

In only minutes Rodney found himself strapped to a small cot on wheels and rolled once more to the Genii's poorly equipped medical bay. Doctor Storr had been warned of the visit and busied himself with keeping Kolya happy and hurrying his feet to obey every sputtering utterance that escaped the commander's angry lips, some words of which he could not make out.

After a litany of protests from the Atlantean physicist Kolya finally ordered his physician to gag his foreign mate and Rodney soon found a small knot of cloth being shoved in his mouth, nearly making him gag and then more binding wound around his mouth and tied at the back of his skull. It well muffled his demands for answers, but it did not stop his attempts.

Rodney was wheeled over to what resembled an antiquated X-ray machine and to Rodney's alarm Doctor Storr draped a thick apron over his own body while leaving Rodney uncovered. He then positioned the machine above his midsection and pressed a button. Rodney heard a click and assumed a weak – he hoped - radiation-image had just been taken of the fetus in his belly.

From across the room an impatient Kolya demanded "_Well?"_

"It will take me some time to develop the image, sir," Storr explained "and, as you already know, we will not likely be able to tell whether the baby is yours or not simply from one radiation image. There are other tests we must perform."

"Call me when they are complete."

Storr sighed. "Yes sir."

Several hours later Doctor Storr entered his office without knocking – one of the few men who had both the authority and the audacity to do so without his permission – and handed him a brown paper folder. "The results of his tests sir. There are two fetuses." He announced.

Kolya sat back in his chair, finding that his lungs did not wish to work as efficiently as a moment before. Finally he found his voice. "Two?"

"Yes."

His heart leaped while his guts churned. "I want the Satedan's child removed."

"I am afraid that while it is reasonable to assume that the larger fetus is his, it is impossible to remove either without causing the death of the other. The blood supply is tightly interwoven between both wombs and the blood supply of the birth father."

His ire still burned deeply but the hope - and joy - for his unborn son swiftly overwhelmed it. His son must be born! Even if he had to wait his turn behind the blasted Satedan's whelp. "Are we to assume that the larger child – the Satedan's child - will be born first?"

"Yes. That is the way with the life-makers. As much as we have been able to research, two or even three fetuses can be carried at any one time, the earliest conception growing far more rapidly than the second, that is, _once_ the first fetus has almost reached full inter-womb maturity. There is mounting evidence that these life-makers can conceive several fetuses at the same time, each womb in turn holding the second and third zygotes in limbo until that which was first conceived has been born. This is nature's way – the new nature's way - of ensuring the greatest number of births in the shortest possible time it seems. Quite brilliant really what nature does."

"Did...is it possible that the Atlanteans started all this?" If so he had underestimated the ingenuity of the humans who populated that ancient city.

"Providing multiple wombs is I believe simply nature's way of ensuring this galaxy does not become bereft of intelligent life. Atlantis – and I'm speaking of the city itself due to the age-old myth that she may be sentient in some way – merely propagated this change in a percentage of its men perhaps a trifle sooner than the rest of the galaxy. This is all still speculation of course but it appears there is some truth to the myth. However there is of course no way to test this theory."

"Yes-yes-yes." Kolya said with an impatient wave of his hand. Storr tended to rattle on although the idea was intriguing. Then he said more gravely "When the first child is ready to be born, you will call me. I wish to be present."

Storr shifted his feet. "And your intentions toward the child?" He looked at his own feet as though there were suddenly of some interest, and then back at his commander. "I assure you commander that although my loyalty is to you, I will not participate in the murder of a new born baby."

"Bring the child alive out of its life-maker - that is your job. What happens to the child afterward..." Kolya lifted his chin "will not be your concern. Return Doctor McKay to my quarters. I shall post guards."

XXX

The signal the Genii themselves never sent out...

Was answered.

"Wraith darts, sir. Dozens of them - maybe _hundreds."_ Barrod shook his commander awake, and frantically reported the terrifying news to him in the near dark. "Through the Gate. We are out-numbered."

When Kolya finally opened his eyes and turned on a light, his servant was stammering. "What shall we do, commander? We have no defense against hundreds of Wraith."

Kolya turned to look at his now awake mate, looking very pregnant and pale in the small light of the lampshade. With two fingers Rodney rubbed at sleep deprived eyes, stifling a yawn. "What's going on?"

Kolya turned back to his servant, noting not for the first time what a young man he still was. Not more than twenty standard years. Young and, right now, too afraid not to show that he was afraid. Hardly more than a foolish boy. He should have remembered such.

Barrod clutched at his commander. "What are we going to do sir?"

Kolya threw off his covers and stood naked in the cool room. "We will do what Genii always do – we fight."

Some of what was being said finally filtered down through Rodney's still half asleep brain to his senses and he was suddenly much more awake, staring at Kolya as though the man really was as mad as he had suspected all along. "Are you insane? We can't fight off hundreds of Wraith. How many soldiers to do have – eighty? And ten-twelve or whatever of _them_ are pregnant! Not to mention the out-dated weapons and you're _one_ ship. It's suicide."

Kolya looked down at Rodney. "We will equip the workers with weapons: knives and Genii rapiers."

Rodney sat up, not without some struggle as his lower abdomen was now tight with four and one half months of baby. He felt like he had swallowed a watermelon. He still managed to throw one exasperated hand in the air. "Oh great plan, Mister Wiz' - _knives_ against Wraith stunners. I'm sure your men will feel real glad they got to _look_ threatening before being taken out with a single shot or a life-sucking Wraith stuck to their chests."

But Kolya wasn't listening to his angry mate. "Tell Fen'." He said to Barrod. "And the_ three_ soldiers guarding our door to collect ammunition and ready their weapons. They must protect Rodney until I get back."

Rodney threw the covers back and struggled to his feet, a task that was getting more and more challenging each day. He stood as naked as the day he was born, his protruding lower belly casting an odd shadow on the wall. "You're leaving me here?" He squeaked. "Even now you're having me guarded with Wraith breathing down our backs?"

Kolya turned to his most trying, and unfaithful, human mate. "They are staying for your _protection_, not to guard you. I will be only moments. Nothing will happen to you. You have my word."

Rodney scoffed. "Oh great, your _word!_ You once promised not to hurt me either, remember how that ended?"

Kolya, now dressed in his pants and slipping on his Genii commander's coat without bothering with a shirt underneath, turned back to him and clutched large hands on Rodney's smaller shoulders. He stared at the little man with such unwavering determination that Rodney actually took a small step back. He was not frightened of Kolya, not anymore. He just didn't want to be left behind.

Rodney said in a small voice "Please don't leave me here." Living with Acustus Kolya had not exactly been his dream vacation, and having a baby in captivity was as far removed from his idea of a good time as he could imagine but being left to be eaten by a Wraith? – Bad. And knowing his unborn child was in danger? Infinitely worse.

Kolya kissed his infuriating mate on the forehead. Weirdly, at that moment, Rodney felt a flutter of something in his chest, a tiny ache or twinge of he-didn't-know-what mingling with the unbridled terror of the invading Wraith. A small stirring deep in his guts, a breath of something not terrible, but very nearly almost perhaps...nice? Something that _didn't_ writhe of perpetual hatred for the man. A thing that possessed its own tiny will and motion, a breaking light, a pin-point of need. Was it hope? Endearment?

Was it desire? No, not desire, but maybe, just maybe..._need_. Especially in this instance. Wraith bearing down on the compound? Yes, he needed Kolya, if only to save his ass. And the baby's. Rodney suddenly felt himself shaking from head to toe. He was in no shape to put up a defence. "What if you don't come back?"

Kolya smiled at him, just one tiny turn of his lips. "Despite your betrayal, you are still carrying what will become my child. My son. Nothing could ever prevent my returning to you both."

Rodney did not feel reassured when Kolya took up his side arm and swept from the room. Barrod turned to him, looking as scared as he felt. Then Barrod swallowed his fear and called for Fen' and the guards to enter the room. "Block the door."

Fen', an older version of himself perhaps, a man not so frightened of his own death, and one weathered by years under Genii protocol, slid the heavy iron bolt across the door. "This will only keep them out for a short while."

Barrod nodded, licking his lips. "I know. But Kolya will return." As much as he respected and feared the man, he was their best hope to survive this onslaught. Like the Wraith, Kolya did not stop to consider consequences. Kolya fought to win. In moments their commander would come back. _He must._

Not two minutes after Kolya had left large footsteps could be heard running down the hall and coming to a sudden halt outside Kolya's quarters. The knob was tried and then heavy hands pounded on the door, shaking it in its metal re-enforced molded frame. Rodney backed away from the door, squeezing his eyes shut, wishing for them to go away. Was it Kolya outside having brought back with him a reassuring army of men? Or was it something else?

Fen' and Kolya's nameless guards backed away as well, weapons raised, they also knew what could be on the other side; things not human nor Genii but which fed on both. Ugly pale, vampire-like bug people. Demon-looking creatures. Universally hated by humans and all Pegasus races. Even the Replicators loathed them.

Rodney swallowed but his throat felt sticky. Despite their large rifle-looking weapons, Fen' and the guards Kolya had left to protect him now seemed to him pathetic and weak. And vastly inferior to hungry Wraith and their warrior drones. Ronan's child leaped inside him, sensing his adrenalin rush, his terror, the fight or flight response.

With Rodney it had often been the latter. Having learned to load and fire a weapon with some proficiency he was still no solider. And now he carried another life to think about; to protect – _to kill for! _But hopefully not to die for, because if his life came to an end today, so did the child he and Ronan had made.

His knees weak with fear but his heart surging with courage, he knew he would fight to his last breath to save the child. It was a kind of sprouting emotional insanity, springing up from nowhere, what he was feeling. This child, whom he did not know beyond its very parasitical physical attachment, was somehow commanding his every movement, his every thought.

It was instinctive; as a scientist Rodney knew that, but the need to save it at all costs, the heightened awareness of it and his sudden avalanche-like rush of love for the child – hit him so fast and so furiously, it was a violent turning over of his psyche. The sheer power of the emotions flowing through him was astonishing. His rational mind was stymied by the reason for it. How was it possible that he could love this child that much _already_? Rational or not, Rodney only knew he must protect his baby at _every_ cost, no matter whom or what got in his way. That was his inner reality.

What was occurring outside his body was another matter altogether and that reality consisted of Genii soldiers who now seemed to him like children, their weapons toys, against a very strong relentless and hungry enemy. Hunger is a powerful drive. Humans killed other life forms in order to satisfy it. He knew the Wraith did the same, only they ate their food animals (which was how the majority of Wraith viewed humans), while still alive.

And they certainly knew how to win a war. Hell, they'd defeated the Ancients for Christ's sake! Even the brilliant Ancients who'd been around for thousands of years had in the end fallen. What the hell was Kolya's ridiculous toy soldiers supposed to do against them?

Suddenly a hole the size of a dinner plate was blasted through the door. The debris, including the bolt holding them inside the small fortress that was Kolya's quarters, vaporised instantly. And when the door flew open, Rodney held his breath as visions of a Wraith's gross feeding digit piercing his chest. And then the nightmare of his body wrinkling and dropping to the floor, the precious son inside him dying without ever having a first breath of real air, made him groan softly with sorrow. "Stupid, arrogant bastard." Rodney whispered under his breath, cursing Kolya where ever he was, and hoping he somehow heard the scathing words. "I should have known your word doesn't mean _shit."_

But it was neither a Wraith, nor the arrogant Kolya who entered the room with his weapon drawn; it was a tall angry Satedan.

Ronan's face, dark and determined, fired first, dropping Fen' and then and the two Genii soldiers with shots so fast it was difficult to follow his movements. Rodney saw with some relief that, this time, the weapon had been set on stun. He had no love for Kolya's men but they had never actually harmed him in any way. It was only Kolya's fists had ever rained down on his head.

Ronan, not even out of breath, aimed his weapon at the third man Barrod. Suddenly Rodney woke up from his frozen mental state. "Don't hurt him, Ronan."

Ronan only regarded the young Genii, recognising him as the one who had brought Rodney to him that night, but still not allowing any quarter until he was certain he could be trusted. He asked "You wanna' die here or leave with us right now? Your choice."

Barrod immediately dropped his gun. But Ronan gestured to it. "You might want to keep that, there's Wraith around."

Barrod nodded and retrieved the weapon. "We should get to the Gate. I know a way only a few Genii are aware of. We should be able to avoid most of the Wraith."

"I know the way already." Ronan said and then in response to Rodney's curious surprise "Think I spent all my off hours sleeping?" and then to Barrod "Kolya's soldiers should have kept me chained up."

Rodney almost fainted with relief. "Well thank god they _didn't_. Besides you would have just bitten through the chains anyway." With a grunt at needing to bend over his distended belly in order to retrieve it, he took up one of the downed guard's side arms and said to Ronan "I thought I was Wraith food for sure."

Ronan turned his weapon's setting back to kill, and then frowned. "I _said_ I'd come for you."

Somewhat petulantly "I know, I know. Now are we leaving already?"

"You," Ronan pointed to Barrod with his weapon, its hilt pointed just enough down and away that it would not harm anyone if the impossible should happen and Ronan accidently fired it, "help him," he said pointing to Rodney. "Follow me." Ronan lead the way and the small group left Kolya's quarters for, Rodney hoped, the very last time.

"The Stargate," Ronan explained in his telegram-ish style, "is above ground. They keep it hidden behind a small cloak. A few miles from the compound. Use a lot of their power for it. Didn't work though. I found it easy'nuff."

Evidently, Rodney thought, as it had been discovered and penetrated by the Wraith and their two-"man" darts. Rodney did his best to keep up with the tall Satedan but even with his arm slung over Barrod's shoulder the quick going was wearing his small reserve of energy thin. "Wait," he gasped for air, "I'm...I can't keep up this pace."

Ronan stopped short and looked at him, his forehead scrunched up. Then he said to Barrod "You willing to take point?"

Oddly enough Barrod recognised the human military terminology and nodded. What the hell, his face said. "We stay here, we probably die."

Ronan took Rodney's arm and slung it over his own right shoulder, Rodney having to stretch his left appendage up a considerable way in order to drape his elbow over the Satedan's substantial width. "Hey, don't pull my arm out if its socket."

"Quiet." Ronan said, not in the mood for any of his mate's crankiness. "Or I'll carry you the _other_ way."

Rodney knew what he meant and shuddered at having to be toted around in his lover's arms like a helpless child, since they both knew that fire-man style was out of the question due to his rounded belly. "Just...get going."

XXX

The Stargate however, was not devoid of trouble.

"I count twelve or so Wraith." Ronan whispered, squatting in the dense brush, his eyes scanning the nearby woods for more.

Rodney beside him said "Thirteen actually and there's probably more that we can't see."

Ronan nodded. "Here's the plan: I go in and kill as many of them as I can. You two make a run for the Gate."

Rodney looked at him as though his much bigger mate's brain had shrunk a few shoe sizes worth. "Are you nuts? Kill yourself so we can be picked off in a more timely fashion? Um, let me see – _no!_ No wonder Sheppard doesn't let you make the mission plans."

Ronan regarded him coolly. After so many years he was used to the little man's sharp tongue. "What's your idea?"

Rodney pressed his lips together. "Give me a minute, I'm _thinking_."

"Well, think faster before more Wraith show up."

"Will you keep your fur-britches on; this isn't going to be as simple as-"

But Ronan shushed him with a raised hand when suddenly the Gate came to life and the powerful rush of worm energy burst from its center like a cone of boiling bubbles, drawing their attention. "Something's coming through the Gate."

"No shit Conan." Rodney snapped. His nerves were on fire. "Probably more Wraith."

But it was not Wraith that burst from the now serene looking "puddle" of the Gate. It was a small round dark object the size of a large fist. Metallic looking it rolled into view and down the wooden erected Genii ramp as though a child's ball had escaped from its master's small hand. Ronan smiled, turned to Rodney and said "Duck."

The resulting explosion knocked them back on their asses.

Rodney sat up after a moment, and Ronan was right there at his side, offering strong fingers to help him rise.

Rodney stood up and shook his head. His ears still ringing, he looked at Ronan and then to the figure walking towards them, his weapon still raised and at the ready, although the Wraith were all down, stunned by the noise and powerful air blast of the shock-bomb. "Sheppard." Rodney said. "Am I ever glad to see you."

Four men were behind him, all checking the prone Wraith to ensure none were near to rising again. But Sheppard himself had immediately noted Rodney's expanded girth, his eyes transfixed. The expression on his face was suddenly unreadable. Finally he tore his gaze away to look again at Rodney's face. "You, too, Rod'."

Then he turned to Ronan saying pleasantly, his face and voice perfect Sheppard-normal, which meant even keel but faintly amused. "I imagine you've had more than enough Genii-arranged shore leave - shall we go?"

Ronan kept his own weapon ready, even though the Wraith soldiers were still down and not yet stirring. "What took you so long?" He followed Sheppard and his men back up the Gate ramp.

Sheppard turned his head just a little so his words would not get lost in the wind. "Oh, you know, this and that - hurry up will ya'."

Once through the Gate, Beckett rushed forward and ushered Rodney onto a gurney, barking orders at his nurses. At an almost invisible gesture from Sheppard Lorne and another Atlantis soldier immediately took Barrod into custody and marched him away.

Rodney said after them. "He's one of the good ones, if you can believe there actually are trustworthy Genii."

Beckett said to Sheppard "I want you, Ronan and the team to the infirmary too. Right now."

Just as they had all turned their backs, and not a second before the Gate shut itself down, another body came through the Gate, rushing through full speed as one who was desperate not to miss the last rung on the last train car as it pulled out of the station would.

Acustus Kolya skidded to a halt when several lethal looking weapons, including Ronan's, were trained on him from only feet away.

Sheppard's stared him down, his eyes hooded and, apart from seething hatred, unreadable in every other way. The man was a leader and Kolya recognised the man's self control as a true mark of all great leaders.

But all fingers on all triggers still twitched.

Rodney, eyes wide, gaped as though at an apparition and then from somewhere inside him, from a deep pocket of himself that he did not think even existed, a voice screamed out at him to stop them from firing, which they all would do, to a man, in the next instant.

Rodney stretched his arms out, palms flat in appeal, opened his mouth and, shocked at himself, shouted a word, an incredulous, unthinkable word: _"WAIT!"_

Beckett's eyes turned to him, and then Sheppard's and Ronan's – though their weapons did not waver from pointing steadily at Kolya's head or heart for even a single breath.

Kolya for his part linked his hands behind his head and slumped to his knees in a recognisable pose of surrender. He had no weapon at his side. His eyes locked on Rodney's in gratitude and...something else that was indefinable.

Sheppard had not failed to note it, and in that second he was convinced that some unspoken, unfathomable but profoundly important message had just passed between kidnapper and victim. Rodney was staring at Kolya and Kolya was staring back and there was a connection there of a depth Sheppard knew he had never experienced with his best friend, the man McKay whom he now understood he loved terribly although he had never said so, and that now he knew he most probably never would speak it. Kolya and Rodney...

Inexplicably suddenly Sheppard felt like he was dying. In the next breath, without any manipulation on his part, apart from his own will in fact, inside him his heart turned to coal, then burned, then drifted away, its sooty ash flying into the far reaches of the universe.

In the next moment Sheppard realised that of course he was not dying but something inside him was. A thing unknown in its entirety but a thing he knew he had somehow treasured beyond all measure, a thing hidden and so beautiful that it bordered on obscene. A forbidden, perfect thing that he had been keeping safe inside him now separated from his soul with a tearing away he felt with an intensity that was almost physical.

This thing that he had secreted in the deepest part of him was blowing away like the white ash from a fire put out and turned cold, or like leaves from a strong-backed tree in a violent storm just before the dead of winter. But this terrible internal death occurred in an instant and its passing was more painful than anything he could remember before in life.

No others present noted its passing. Sheppard stood alone against the agony of his own bored-out soul.

Rodney said. "Please...no..." He stared back at his friends who had risked themselves to find him and Ronan. Who had risked their lives to face down the hated man called Acustus Kolya, the man who had once tried to destroy them all. The murderer. The killer – the _rapist!_ - named Kolya.

Knowing he could not explain to them why he was saying it, because he could not explain it to himself at that moment either, Rodney said again in a painful whisper. To any hearer, it was even a _plea..._

"_Please_, Colonel...please don't kill him."

XXX

On vacation for two weeks, **so the next part as soon as I am able.** I may do some writing during my time off. I'll try.

Genie


	8. Chapter 8

A Habit of Force Part 8

G.E. Waldo

XXX

"Lie back Rodney." Beckett urged in soothing tones, adding a _tsk_-ing noise under his breath when he strapped the cuff around Rodney's upper arm, inflated the cuff and saw the physicist's blood pressure reading. "Looks like we got you back here just in time."

"Why, is it bad?" Rodney asked though his words drifted from his lips absent of any real interest. He was so tired he could have fallen sleep right there sitting up on the good doctor's examination table. He laid back and rested his head on a pillow a nurse thoughtfully provided. "What's wrong?"

"Other than your blood pressure is above normal – normal for you that is – and your accelerated heart beat and the obvious signs of stress carved into your face..." Beckett hung his stethoscope back around his neck, "you're in no _immediate_ danger." He walked a few feet away and pulled the Ancient tech' scanner over to his patient. "Although I'd like to do a full body scan on you – and on the baby in particular. You're already over-due by a day."

Rodney looked at him strangely. "What do you mean I'm overdue? I have four months to go..." seeing Beckett's expression "_don't_ I?"

Beckett smiled, his eyes softly amused. "That was in the old days, Rodney, and that was _women_. You're a _man_ in case you've forgotten or more precisely a _womb_-man."

""_Womb_-man"? _That's_ your new term? Oh my god...and of _course_ I haven't forgotten."

"Good. Well, we've learned a few things while you've been away. Several of the _womb_-man's have given birth, most of them labouring at five and half months. At first I thought it was a series of late miscarriages, but it does seem to be the new normal."

Rodney stared back at the doctor with wide eyes. "How big are the babies? Can they even survive at five months?"

Beckett rushed to reassure his suddenly much paler patient. "Yes, yes, don't worry yourself. They are all fine, healthy little boys, as yours will be I'm certain. Very small of course, the majority of the bulking up occurs outside the uterus. We already have four new members of Atlantis to celebrate," He smiled at Rodney's swollen abdomen, "soon to be five." Beckett placed the scanner over Rodney's distended belly and when the image came into focus, he spent a moment looking intently at the screen.

Rodney watched the monitor curiously. He had never seen inside himself, and had no idea what his unborn child looked like. Kolya had never let him in on anything, not even the health of his own child except to have Storr coo reassurances that all was well. But once Kolya had learned about the baby's true sire, his face had turned crimson and without warning he'd had Rodney trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey and then scanned in Genii doctor's pathetic excuse for a medical bay. Kolya had not been a happy man to learn that the baby was not his.

To Rodney however it had been a triumph deluxe.

Rodney shook off the unpleasant memory and stared at the screen. So far all he could make out was a smudge the size of a cucumber but even so the small person curled up inside his womb captured his gaze as though by an unseen will, reaching out to him with an invisible hand, caressing his heart and making it flutter. Suddenly he realised he had a goofy grin on his face and swiftly wiped it away. "Womb-man is a stupid name by the way." He remarked. Although he had to admit it was marginally better than _Altered's_. "Well, tell me already Carson- is everything okay?"

Beckett was frowning however and checking the scanner controls. "I'm not certain, there seems to be something..." then his scrunched up features cleared. "Ah, I see." He turned a beaming face to his friend. "Congratulations Rodney, you're going to be a father to two sons." He pointed a helpful finger to a second smudge on the screen, this one the size of a thimble.

Rodney felt his light and happy heart take a fast elevator to the basement of his guts. "What do you mean?" But Beckett was not a quack and Rodney already knew instinctively that only one of the babies was Ronan's. The other...the thought made him feel sick. Unclean. He protested his doubts anyway, hoping he was wrong. Hoping Beckett was wrong. "There can't be_ two_. That's impossible. Scan me again."

Beckett shrugged helplessly but still he was grinning like a proud uncle. "There is no need, Rodney. And as I said, there have been new developments in our understanding since you've been away. The reproductive physiology of womb-men is quite remarkable really."

Having two babies inside him was not remarkable, it was terrifying. Rodney stared at the image, now a mixture of fear and confusion, love and loathing. The one was his beautiful son by the strong and good Ronan, and the other by a man who had held him captive for months. A killer who had beaten and raped him. "I want the second one cut out of me."

Beckett turned a shocked face to him, his eyes wide. "I beg your pardon?"

"You heard me. I want the other one, the second one, _gone_. I want it aborted."

Beckett suddenly understood the possible reason why his patient was suddenly advocating the killing of one of his own unborn. "Rodney, no matter what that man did to you it isn't the baby's fault." He said gently. "The child's just an innocent."

"I want it _out_ of me!" Rodney yelled, all his pent up fury at Kolya, all those weeks of being cornered, abused and treated like a commodity erupting from his soul in a base need to take revenge upon the Genii commander – and to kill the thing he had forced upon him. To eradicate all evidence of the rape from his body and mind.

Beckett stared down at him sadly. "I can't do that Rodney. Never mind the ethical implications; I'm afraid it's impossible to terminate one baby without risking the other. To kill one means to kill both. There's also a high probability that you would die as well. The blood supplies for all three of you are tightly intermingled. The placental barriers keep infections and such from reaching the babies but other than that..." He bit his lip, able to only imagine what his friend had gone through under Kolya's cruel hand. "We just...we just_ can't_."

Rodney stared at the monitor beside the bed, and the two living beings inside him, one his precious gift from Ronan, the other a parasite from a hated physical union he had fought against. It seemed inconceivable that he could ever want it or love it. "Patient-doctor confidentiality – right?" He asked very quietly, still staring unblinkingly at the screen and this newest assault upon his senses. _"Right?_ You can't disclose any of this to anyone, that's right isn't it?"

Beckett sighed, afraid of what Rodney was asking. "That's correct but Rodney-"

"_No_! I don't want anyone knowing about the second baby." His eyes flickered back to the screen just for a second. "Why is it so tiny anyway – the other one I mean? It's the size of a grape. I don't see why it would be so hard to get rid of it."

"That's just how it works with womb-men. Most have two or three uteruses, up to three babies can be carried, with only one maturing at a time. You understand what that means don't you? You will only be able to keep this quiet for a short time. And once you have your first baby, the other one will begin its cycle to maturity." Beckett cleared his throat "But there are other factors that you may be unaware of..." The doctor realised he had lost his patient's attention. "Rodney...?"

Rodney swallowed so thickly that Beckett could actually hear his throat workings rubbing against each other. _"Three?"_ Rodney repeated his whisper. Cold sweat ran down his cheeks. "_Three_ wombs?" Then he promptly fainted.

XXX

Ronan recognised the slump of the shoulders anywhere and stole up behind him, slipping a hand around his unsuspecting mate's waist and caressing his unborn child. Whenever he touched Rodney's expanding belly he felt his heart skip with joy. "Mornin'" He said in his ear, his touch and sudden approach making Rodney jump.

Ronan then took a seat opposite his mate who sat picking over his breakfast of Atlantis's equivalent of oatmeal. It had clearly gone cold and was congealing into an unappetizing lump. "Not hungry?" Ronan asked and scooped up his own breakfast of scrambled bird eggs with a fork shovelling it into his mouth.

Rodney did not even look up. "No."

Ronan realised Rodney was in what humans called a depression. An emotional state characterized by lethargy and often inexplicably prolonged sadness. Realising that Beckett would be the one to assign whatever treatment he needed, Ronan decided not to ask Rodney why he was depressed. Besides he could make a good guess. Even so he needed to know something. It had been niggling at his mind for several days. "Why didn't you want Sheppard to kill him?"

Rodney did look at him then and Ronan wondered if it was a question over which Rodney himself had pondered. Not one given to telling lies well, it seemed Rodney had decided to speak the truth. "I...I don't know." Rodney was staring at him, biting his bottom lip. "I've been asking myself too, you know?" He continued to pick at his food dispiritedly. "The whole time all I could think of was that I wanted him dead. Hoping someone would kill him for me." He sighed heavily. "So I don't know why I said that."

It was painful to hear such a truth from Rodney's lips. Thoughts of what that mouth could do went straight to Ronan's groin but he knew this was no time to voice his sudden physical longing for his mate. "What's going on?" There was something more here than Kolya's presence in Atlantis.

Rodney shared a different truth. "Sheppard won't even look at me. He's...I think..." His eyes shifted to stare away, somewhere else in the room, some neutral place where there was no accusations or disgust to be meted out in return. "I think he's disgusted with me."

Rodney loved Sheppard of course and Ronan was well aware that the reverse was true, but maybe it wasn't so clear to Rodney. "No he doesn't." Ronan suspected that Sheppard was hurt that Rodney was carrying his child instead of the colonel's. But the colonel would have to understand. It had been their only option at the time. A military leader could understand that.

"He hasn't said so such as a word to me since I got back." Rodney complained.

"Give him some time."

That sparked some anger. "That's what everybody always says." Rodney snapped. "That time will make it all better. It's so _stupid_." He threw down his spoon. "In case you haven't noticed, Ronan, time doesn't make _any_thing better." He sighed and looked down at his bowl of neglected oatmeal. "Time just brings what it brings."

Ronan didn't know what to say. It was clear that Rodney wasn't up to a pep talk, and he was no good at them anyway, so he simply spoke some truth back. A truth he knew to be fact. "Sheppard loves you. A lot." Then he spoke his heart. "At least as much as I do."

Rodney stared across the table at him, his expression unreadable. Unusual for Rodney. "Why?"

Like from so many of the Atlantis humans, the question itself made no sense. It was as though even they did not understand their own language or the feelings it was supposed to convey. "Because you're carrying my child. That makes you mine."

Now it was Rodney's turn to frown. "_Yours_? What are you talking about?"

"On Sateda when you make a baby together, you become each other's. You belong. You become mates."

Rodney stared at him for a few seconds as though he had finally gone nuts. "Mates?" Rodney looked around. He hadn't meant to say it so loudly. He gestured back and forth between them with one very agitated finger. "You and I are _not_ mates. We're not married, betrothed or even dating."

If Rodney did not reciprocate his feelings then fine. Ronan tried reason. "You're going to need help raising our child, McKay. And he's my child too. I want to be in on it. All the way."

"Fine, be in on it but we're not moving in together, we're not going to get cozy and change diapers together and we're sure as hell not - and I mean not as in never, ever - sleeping together again or making another kid as long as I live."

That hurt. Ronan stared back at the stubborn scientist who may have been the smartest man he had ever met but who did not know what was good for him. Ronan could never understand why McKay seemed intent on going through life alone. He understood alone, as he himself had spent seven years alone and on the run. Being alone then was necessary. But why be alone if you don't have to be? Why suffer when help is just down the hall or right next door, or has made love to you in secret?

"Fine." The rejection hurt more than he expected but he would not force his presence on McKay. That was not the Satedan way either. "We don't have to be together, but he's my child too and I want to be a father to him just as much as you do."

"Fine. We'll...we'll work something out once he's born."

"Good."

"Once this baby is born this birthing crap is over – done! I'm never going through this...pregnancy stuff ever again."

Ronan pressed the point. "How do you know you won't want another?"

Rodney's eyes fell to his bowl instead of his team-mate. "Are you deaf? I was _raped_."

"_I_ didn't rape you." It was a side he did not often show but Ronan knew how to be gentle at those who he recognised as more fragile than him. He said very softly "I'm sorry I couldn't stop Kolya."

Rodney sighed. His eyes were bloodshot and it was clear had had not been sleeping when proper rest was now more important than ever. "Not your fault."

Ronan wondered what had happened to the scientist to make him this way? Did he trust _anyone_? "Why do you want to be alone McKay?" Even in Atlantis he spent most of his time alone. Ronan suspected being on Sheppard's team was the first taste of belonging, of being with people that watched out for you - the physicist had ever experienced.

"Because it's safer. I'll kill myself first before I'll let any man touch me again without my permission." Rodney said, almost to himself though Ronan heard him. The smaller man stood. "And you're wrong about Sheppard. You didn't see his face. He can't stand the sight of me."

Ronan let him slip away. He had a hunch that Rodney was keeping things from him, important things and he wanted to know what. Abandoning his own food he headed to the infirmary.

When Beckett saw him enter he already had a reply on his lips. "I can't tell you the results of the scans." He said, waving a hand at Ronan as though to dismiss any more questions the Satedan might have before they were even spoken.

"I'm his _mate_. He's carrying _my_ baby." That was all that the doctor needed to understand - the right of the alpha-mate to protect his lover and his child. "I have a right to know if he's okay or not."

Beckett turned around, many bottles of pills in his hands. Cataloguing the supplies probably, Ronan guessed. They would soon grow short of medicines and the Daedulus wasn't due for another delivery for weeks. "I assure you that Rodney is okay. He is only hours from delivery now and I don't want him unduly stressed or upset. I can only assume you want the same."

"Of course I want that, but I know there's something he's keeping from me. His eyes told me." Not scientific but he knew it was true. Rodney was easy to read, and even simpler now that he felt closer to the stubborn physicist than anyone. There was more than sex between them, there was now a_ life_. A child created from them both. To a Satedan a pregnant mate meant more than successful sex, it meant they were connected, like soil was to rain, or like Atlantis was to their very survival.

Ronan had not yet spoken these things to Rodney. Now seemed to be not the time for it. It had always bothered him that there was often so much uncertainty when it came to Earth humans and their hearts. Uncertainty even in the things which were supposed to be the most certain, such as the binding love one had for your chosen mate or for the children of his body. Earth humans were wary creatures, guarding their drifting souls even from those who loved them most.

Ronan loved Rodney, as he had loved his team-mates, only now with the mate-bond as well, which deepened it to the endless depths of the ocean and the farthest reaches of the galaxy. A much more powerful love clutched at his soul now. Something unbreakable, protective, adoring, and so sexually satisfying there were no words. He loved Rodney hungrily but with a gentleness of touch he had not felt since home; the love of a Satedan for his pregnant mate.

Ronan wondered if Rodney felt it. He wondered if Rodney saw him that way at all. "I _have_ to know."

Beckett knew Rodney would not be able to keep the information from Ronan, or anyone else, for long. It was as endearing as it was occasionally frustrating that the man could not tell a lie to literally save his own life. "Aye." He sighed wearily. "Aye, my friend, I understand. Rodney's a brilliant man but in some ways he's like a child himself." Beckett knew he was more than fond of the scientist, that he was perhaps even in love with his frustrating friend and patient. But right now he knew Rodney was hands-off. A state he also understood that might persist for many years if the look in Ronan's eyes was anything to go by.

Beckett dismissed his own desires and turned to Ronan's determined face. "I'm breaking an ethical vow if I say anything."

"Those vows were made a long time ago on Earth. A place none of us will ever go again. This is Atlantis. Things have changed." When Beckett said nothing Ronan added "Rodney talked of suicide this morning."

Beckett's mouth dropped open. "My god. Do you believe he was serious? That he might be thinking of it?"

"You mean is he going to kill himself? – No. But he's depressed. He needs help." Ronan said reasonably. "I don't know how to help him if I don't know what's wrong."

Beckett sat down heavily in his swivel chair, the one with wheels that Ronan had always admired. Given many human's tendencies to laziness, and their particularly brilliance for invention, Ronan had often thought the chair a quintessentially human mechanism of convenience. "What I'm about to tell you can't go beyond us. Now that's out of respect for Rodney, mind, but his welfare has to be my first concern."

Ronan nodded. "Mine too."

"First of all Rodney is all right, _physically_. The babies appear to be healthy." Beckett watched the light dawning on Ronan's face. "That's right, I said bab_ies_."

"Twins?"

Beckett shook his head. "No. There is a second fetus in a second womb. There is a third womb, just so you know, and that one is empty."

"Three wombs?"

"Aye, it's the way of it now, with womb-men. Most have two or three uteruses. Each uterus can carry a single fetus but by two different men in the case of a womb-man with two uteruses or, like in Rodney's case, three uteruses can carry three fetuses although Rodney isn't, carrying a third one I mean. Only, the thing is, he had to have been with – er – two different men in order to conceive two different fetuses, or three to carry three as the case may be."

Ronan wanted to clasp his hands around Kolya's throat and squeeze until the life drained from his face. "What you're telling me is Rodney is pregnant with Kolya's child as well."

"As far as my knowledge goes, I'd say that is correct, unless there was someone else..?"

"No." Ronan answered, feeling the shock of the news wash over him though his face stayed as neutral as stone. He was not accustomed to giving confidences but he had found Beckett to be a man of discretion. "No, no one else. Just me and..."

Beckett nodded, averting his eyes. "I see. I'm, um, sorry Ronan...about what happened to Rodney."

"I was the first. We thought we were preventing it, stopping Kolya from making a baby inside him if we..." Ronan clarified it a bit more "by me and Rodney having a baby together, by me getting him pregnant first. We thought we had locked the son-of-a-bitch out."

"I'm sorry." Beckett had nothing else to say. There was nothing else. "Try not to blame yourself...or Rodney. What is done is done and all that is paramount now is Rodney's health and that of the babies."

"I don't blame Rodney. What if we...can we stop the other baby?"

"That was Rodney's first question too and the answer is not without killing the first one, or Rodney." Beckett searched his Satedan friend's handsome face. "Look, there is, uh, one possibility, but it's one I hesitated to mention to Rodney because of his present level of anxiety if ya' will. I'm worried about his stress and how it might affect the deliveries."

"Are you telling me he's in danger?"

"No, not exactly but his blood pressure is high and at this stage of his pregnancy I cannot risk giving him any medications that could affect the baby."

"But he could...what – have a heart attack?"

"No but he could stroke out. I'm going to take extra precautions during the delivery of your son Ronan, heat compresses for one, and one of the men knows meditative techniques which might help Rodney during the worst of the contractions."

Ronan laughed. A short disbelieving yip. "He'll never agree to them. Thinks they're bullshit."

Beckett waved a knowing hand "I know, I know, meditation and Rodney are like nitro and glycerine – he doesn't believe in it but if it helps even a little bit...maybe you could convince him."

"Maybe." Ronan had doubts as to his success. Except for fantastic sex, the two times they'd had it, he and the scientist rarely saw eye to eye on anything. "What's the possibility you mentioned?"

"If Rodney becomes pregnant with a third child, and by that I mean he'd have to conceive a child with a third man who is not you or Kolya, then the third baby might over-take the growth of the second. It happened to one other womb-man." Beckett held up a restraining palm. "Now listen to me before you get any ideas. That incident by no means set a precedent because the genetics of the second baby were in question. It might have simply been nature's way of eliminating the defective fetus – there's no guarantee this would happen again, or occur on any regular basis."

"Then why did you mention it?"

"Because I want you to be aware of all the risks to Rodney, no matter what course you decide on – and the final decision would have to be his of course."

"I think we should try it." Ronan said.

"I was about to add that it isn't something I recommend as it could also risk Rodney's well being. He's not a young man anymore. Most of the others are still men in their twenties but Rodney...you might just end up with three fetuses and even greater risk to Rodney."

"He's strong. Stronger than most of you think."

"Yes, he's strong but even stubbornness has its limits and I'm sorry but it's not an option I can sanction."

But Ronan was already fielding some possible sperm donors. "Rodney thinks Sheppard hates him but..." No other possible sperm donor came to mind. None that Ronan would have supported touching Rodney with a single finger never mind sticking their cock in him and making a baby.

Beckett cleared his throat. "Er, well, I'm sure I can't think of one either, even if I were to support such an attempt which I do not I'd like to remind you. But in the end wouldn't the choice – the _who_ - really be up to Rodney?"

Ronan nodded, however reluctant his feelings about another man fucking his mate. Yet there was in fact _one_ other man. "What about you?"

Beckett blushed to the roots of his spiky hair. "Me? Well, er - I'm not sure...I mean Rodney probably doesn't...and I never really...plus as I said it's too dangerous."

"You're perfect. You're already friends, you care about him, you're a healthy male and you would never do anything to harm him."

"That's true of course but still I'm not certain it's what he would want plus, again, the risk to Rodney."

Ronan didn't believe in wasting time. "What if I ask him and he says yes. Would you be willing?"

Beckett felt his heart in his throat. Suddenly confronted by the possibility of having what his body had been aching for, he was now not entirely sure if it _was_ what he wanted. "No. No, Ronan, I'm sorry but no." Beckett stood to underline the point he was trying to convey. "Look, Lord knows I'd be flattered if Rodney would – um – _accept_ me but as his physician I am aware of the risks to his health and in my medical opinion they would be too much. He's thirty-eight years old and he's doing the kind of work that only a young person should be doing – running around off-world, skipping meals, skipping_ sleep_, getting shot at...and now I've learned he's carrying two children to boot. I'm more than a little concerned...especially someone with his blood pressure and temperament. Plus his tendencies to-"

"Freak out?" Ronan used the colloquialism he had heard Sheppard so often voice.

"Er yes, exactly. No, I'm afraid the risks are too great. I cannot participate in anything that has the potential to hurt Rodney either physically or emotionally."

"He's not handling the idea of Kolya's baby being inside him so well right now."

"But he could come around to be all right with it. You'd be surprised at the bond that can develop between mothe- I mean _father_ and son."

"I know he'll be a good father. You'll see. He has me."

Beckett nodded. "We're all grateful for that Ronan."

Ronan, as was his way, simply nodded and left but he did so with too many pictures flying around in his head. Rodney with two babies inside him; Kolya grinning at his success in impregnating Rodney despite their attempts to thwart him; Kolya still sitting there alive in his jail cell when by rights the man should have already been put to death for his crimes.

And, not least of which_, himself_ becoming a father. It seemed life was laying out the bricks in his road without so-much as a pause to let him catch his breath.

But _two_ babies. Never mind, he and Rodney would raise them both as their own. He was convinced he could make Rodney see reason. It was a baby. Babies were cute and no matter their ancestry, they were innocent. Rodney would be a good dad, once he got over his fears.

There was only one thing to do right now to settle his mind and focus his heart on the task of fatherhood: eliminate the rival, if not in body then in mind.

Ronan turned on his heel and instead of heading to his quarters he went straight to the holding area where Kolya was sequestered in a cell. Really it was just small room with a small bed and a sturdy locked door. Two of Sheppard's men were posted outside it. "Let me in." Ronan ordered.

The two guards looked at each other and then back at him. The taller of the two answered "The colonel's orders are no one gets in without him present."

"This _is_ Sheppard's order."

"Oh. Well, he didn't tell us."

Ronan was growing impatient. "He told _me_. And who am I?"

The taller guard licked his lips. "You're his Second in Command."

"That's right and I just gave you an order."

The shorter guard, without clearing it with the other, stepped aside and punched in a code. The door slid aside. Ronan had enough sense not to keep the guards out. They raised their weapons and followed him inside, though keeping their distance as Ronan stepped closer to the prisoner.

Kolya had been lying down but sat up the instant the door had opened. He watched Ronan walk up to him without fear, knowing Sheppard would never have ordered a summary execution without due process. The colonel was just military enough to follow orders, despite being cut off from his Earth Command Center.

Ronan spoke in a voice so low it was almost a whisper. "If it were up to me, I'd kill you right this second."

Kolya looked at his own scuffed shoes. "Well, then I am grateful that it is not up to you."

This he said more loudly and with a certain amount of quiet glee. "You will _never_ see your child." He said simply, satisfied at the look of uncertainty on Kolya's face and the flash of dark anger that followed. Ronan could imagine the man's heart falling through the planet to a stone cold grave. To never see your own child born, to never hold him, teach him, love him. To know your enemy would raise him, and that others would see him grow and prosper until he became part of the _enemy_ camp. To be denied your right as a father - it was a fitting punishment for an abuser and rapist. "And you will _never_ touch Rodney again. Not as long as I am alive to prevent it."

Ronan allowed himself a moment to revel in Kolya's turmoil although the Genii man was still a soldier and after a moment the hateful expression on his face smoothed flat and the way between them fell to a stony silence. But the enemy leader-now-captive had to be hurting to his core.

It felt good. Not only would he deny the Genii enemy his unwilling lover, he would take his son from him. It wasn't much, not as good as taking the man's life, but to Ronan it was right. It was not what would have happened to Kolya on Sateda but this was Atlantis and the humans here played with a different set of rules. It would have to do.

XXX

The plastic cup of water fell from his hands, spilling its contents between their feet.

"Rodney?" Sheppard happened to be passing into the kitchens at that exact moment as Rodney had been exiting and the liquid spilled, washing over his boots. In fact he had been seeking Rodney out to apologise and had almost bowled him over.

Any thoughts regarding words of sorry vanished at the twisted features on Rodney's face. "Hey...you okay?"

In answer Rodney doubled over and from between clenched teeth a hard groan escaped. He managed to shake his head.

Sheppard noted that Rodney had one hand pressed against his rounded belly while the other scrambled for support on the nearby wall.

Suddenly he suspected the possible source of the physicist's distress. "Oh _crap!"_ Sheppard grabbed onto the physicist's flailing appendage with his left hand and threw his other arm around his friend's shoulders. "Come on - let's get you to the infirmary."

"Sheppard to Beckett - Rodney's in distress...we're on our way there from the Kitchens. Have a team meet us. I think...I think the baby's coming."

"_I'll have a team on the way in a flat minute colonel."_ It was Beckett's voice. _"How far apart are the contractions?"_

"I have no idea. I just sort of bumped into him a minute ago. But he looks like he's in a lot of pain."

"_Hmmm, man having a baby is in pain..." _A bit of Beckett sarcasm. Sheppard just tried to concentrate on moving along as fast as possible.

"This isn't funny Carson!" Rodney had recovered enough to protest. "And how am I supposed to have this thing anyway? I mean it's not like I have a-"

"_For now just concentrate on breathing deeply, Rodney."_

"Easy for you to say," McKay replied. "You're not the one with fifteen extra pounds on his frame, having to pee every ten minutes and now agonizing spasms." His face had turned pink from either the pain or his own emotions, Sheppard wasn't sure which.

Finally to Sheppard's relief a gurney arrived along with Beckett and a male nurse. Almost at the same second, Ronan appeared and without a word or so much as breaking his stride, elicited a surprised yelp out of Rodney by lifting him over-the-thresh-hold style and setting him on the gurney.

"Hey watch it Conan. That's my ass you're tossing around and it's already sore." Rodney snapped. "I'm carrying around a baby in case you're forgotten."

Ronan merely looked expectantly at Beckett who urged Rodney to lay back with one hand on his shoulder. "Come on Rodney; let's get you to the infirmary where you'll be more comfortable."

XXX

Once Rodney had been stripped of his clothing and a hospital gown tied loosely around his frame, Beckett had him lie down on a bed covered in a plastic fabric. The sight of it had made Rodney whiten to the same shade of pale as the sheet. "Oh my god, there's going to be blood, isn't there?" He stared up at Beckett with saucer eyes. "Lots of blood. That's why the plastic sheets. I hate blood. I hate bleeding, I hate _pain_ - I hate_ all_ of this."

Beckett rolled his eyes. "All things common to giving birth." Beckett sighed. "Try to relax Rodney. The other womb-men survived and fathers and babies are doing just fine. I promise you'll get through this."

Rodney glanced over at Sheppard who was hovering nearby and he leaned over to his right to better whisper to Beckett. "How gross is this going to be anyway? I don't want an audience. I mean except Ronan."

Rodney glanced up at Ronan who stood nearby with his arms crossed. Only the tall Satedan could manage to look worried and pissed-off all at the same time. "You don't have to stay either." Rodney assured him.

Ronan frowned. "You're my mate. I'm not leaving."

"Stop calling me that." Rodney shifted under the thin sheet. "You may have knocked me up but we're not _married_."

But Ronan was having none of it. "You're carrying my child. That's good enough on Sateda."

"Well thank god this isn't Sateda." Rodney squinted up his face. "Can't you stand over the corner and glower? Go and keep Sheppard company or something."

Ronan relented and went to stand by the colonel.

Beckett sighed. "Well you're going to have to endure at least two people near you I am sorry to say. I'll need one of my nurses present."

"Okay but no one else, and especially not Sheppard. I don't want Sheppard here."

Beckett frowned at his recalcitrant patient. "He's only trying to help, Rodney. And he's your friend."

"_Was_. He _was_ my friend. Until a few minutes ago it seemed like he couldn't stand the sight of me. You think I want him to see all...all _this_ too? That's hardly going to help matters."

"It's not as bad as you think." Beckett assured him. "In fact, you're kind of cute all chubby like this."

Beckett swore he could see steam coming out of Rodney's ears.

"I am_ not_ chubby!" Rodney said loudly enough for the whole infirmary to hear. "I'm just pregnant. So just do whatever voo-doo you have to do and get this over with. I want to get back to my life."

Beckett decided not to mention that his patient's life was about to change permanently. "As for the voo-doo, that's mostly under your body's control. We're just here to make sure nothing goes wrong."

McKay started. "You think something's going to go wrong? What?"

"I swear...I've never seen the like..." Beckett muttered under his breath. He turned to place a mask on his patient's face.

"What's that for?" Rodney asked suspiciously.

"To help you relax." Beckett explained with an angelic smile. "Unless you liked me to take it away because I can certainly do tha-"

But before it was out of reach Rodney snatched it from his hand. "No. No, I'll take it-I'll take it."

Beckett walked over to Ronan and Sheppard. "That's more for my peace than his." He said to them confidentially. "It's a very mild mix of nitrous oxide and oxygen. It won't harm him or the babies...more of a placebo really."

Sheppard nodded but mouthed silently to Ronan _babies?, though still_ keeping his eye on Rodney from the edge of the infirmary door. Ronan just grunted and then said "I'll explain later."

The patient was sucking in great draughts of the gas. "So how does this work doc'?" Sheppard asked. "I mean how does a man give birth anyway...is it going to hurt him...you know all that much?"

"Yeah." Ronan added.

Beckett's face softened at the colonel's hidden agenda, one he wondered if Ronan had also picked up on. Sheppard was sick with worry over Rodney. "He'll be fine. He just doesn't want anyone to see him this...vulnerable. He's scared."

Sheppard nodded.

Beckett decided to let them both in on the basics. "I know you've only heard reports about how it happens but basically the skin just above his groin thins until it splits, the placental wall swells until it also splits. We simply remove the baby and put in a few stitches. The contraction pain is actually the uterus pushing aside the abdominal muscles to reach the epidermal layers. It's really remarkable actually. Once the baby is removed and the umbilical cut, the after birth is squeezed through the same way. The healing is incredible quick and only a tiny white scar remains once it's all done."

"So he's awake through it all?" Ronan asked.

"No, the patient usually falls into a sort of half waking state of relaxation. I'm not sure why yet, other than it does spare the pregnant man some discomfort and with Rodney, we could use all the help we can get." Beckett looked a bit uncomfortable. "Uh colonel, once the delivery begins you'll have to leave - er - it was Rodney's request."

Sheppard glanced at Ronan and then nodded. His head had been reeling ever since he'd seen the bulge below Rodney's belt that first day back in the Gate room. "Yeah, sure, I understand." He said to Ronan "Let me know when he's able to have visitors, would you? I've got some...apologizing to do. And uh, congratulations...to you both."

Ronan nodded but his eyes followed him as he walked away. Not one to reveal his emotions all that often he was still in tune with them enough to recognise the same in others. Sheppard was hurting and he could guess why. The colonel had wanted Rodney for himself.

"Thanks." Ronan said. But Rodney was not his and the scientist had made it clear. McKay belonged to himself. He didn't know whether he should reveal that fact to Sheppard or not and since he could not decide, he chose to wait and think upon it for a while. Perhaps the universe would decide for him, and for them all, as it had so often done before.

"Take it easy Rodney, we're almost done." Beckett urged. Sweat was pouring down both their faces. Under his doctor's careful hands, the tiny newborn was emerging from between the lips of Rodney's torn abdominal skin, just below the navel but above the groin, where the epidermis was thinnest.

"What do you mean _"we"_?" Rodney snarled between spasms of pain. "I'm doing all the work. All you're doing is catching him."

"Aye and getting ready to stitch you up afterward, so just stop squirming and let nature do its work."

"_You_ stop squirming. I'll squirm all I want - I'm in pain!"

Beckett managed not to roll his eyes as he tied off the umbilical cord and then, with deft snip of his surgical scissors, separated father from offspring. "There we go," He said as he wrapped the wiggling baby in a sterile blanket and handed it off to his helper nurse.

The beefy nurse with hands almost as big as the baby took it a few feet away while Rodney followed the proceedings with anxious eyes. "Well? Is he okay? He's healthy right? He's not a mutant or something is he?"

Beckett looked down at his most trial-some patient. "Of course he's not a mutant. Your baby is healthy and strong Rodney. He's just too tiny to cry just yet but he's breathing normally. Roger is simply measuring him and checking his airway to make sure it's completely clear. Now you go to sleep."

"Sleep? I'm not going to go to sleep."

While Rodney continued to protest his body's demands for slumber, Ronan looked expectantly at Beckett. He smiled kindly. "Yes Ronan, go and see your newborn son but put on a mask first, and congratulations." When Beckett turned back to his patient, Rodney already had his eyes close, dead to the world.

Beckett explained when he saw Ronan's concerned look at the suddenly silent Rodney. "It's normal for womb-men to – well for lack of a better term - virtually pass out after giving birth." As he spoke Beckett began to expertly suture up the four inch wound above Rodney's groin using sterile gauze and a fine curved needle. "The male body did not originally evolve to carry a baby never mind go through the agony of giving birth to one. Rodney's in what I've come to call MBRS - Male Birth Recovery Stage or BRS for short. He'll sleep now for more than a day while his body does its initial healing. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to clean the wound and finish these sutures."

From the sterile safety of a dozen yards away, a mask on his face, Ronan held his tiny son and watched the doctor care for his sleeping lover. His small world of one, that of a lone Satedan soldier had become three, a family, and so for him an all new place to be. But looking down at the exquisitely small features of his perfect son and the slack features of his exhausted, unconscious mate (even though Rodney had rejected the title of endearment), it was a world he didn't mind at all.

XXX

Two beautiful brown eyes looked up at him from a face so tiny it was difficult to believe it wasn't a child's toy.

His son looked much like his father. His _sire _father. Almost nothing of his own face could he see in his new born. It was both exhilarating and disappointing. Rodney had hoped that at least something of himself would be present. Blue eyes perhaps, a strong jaw line, perhaps even the blondish curls he had sported as a child. Beckett had assured him that as he grew the baby's bone structure would change and he would eventually see bits of his own features in the child, but Rodney was doubtful.

But at least the child would have his brains if not his looks. He would be brilliant, a shining star among the dull and mundane of humanity, a child meant for great things.

His child would be special. Still he could not stop his heart from pounding wildly in his chest whenever he thought about someday or the future or what-if's. He had a _son_, a child, a baby, another living human being with needs and demands who now depended on him for everything. He now had a _baby_, a completely helpless and completely demanding creature that needed him constantly. An infant wanting him, crying for him, who would probably die without him! What if he made a mistake? What if he forgot to feed him? Although Rodney knew that wasn't too likely since the child had screamed to be fed every two hours around the clock since he was born.

Rodney glanced nervously over at the half full bottle of formula in the bottle warmer sitting on his desk. His desk that used to house his personal lap-top and his collection of rare volumes on physics was now piled high with bottles, nappies, wipes and diapers, all lovingly provided by the Post-Natal Nursing Unit that Sheppard had set up to ease the burden of the womb-men and their partners (those who had one), because they were now in the business of being very busy and very exhausted new parents.

Rodney could empathise. Evidently he was not the only one feeling the pinch of fatherhood as the unit of volunteer baby-sitters and care-givers was already being used almost to capacity. It was so much to think about, so much on his already burdened shoulders that when he thought too much about it the enormity of his imagined future crushed down on his chest and he almost stopped breathing.

Rodney pushed aside the scary thoughts and tucked the blanket Zelenka had given him up to the ridiculously fragile neck of his nine day old son. He sat wearily down on the edge of his bed. His back ached with all the carrying and feeding and the constant tension from the seemingly endless worry of what he could be doing wrong.

Beckett had ordered two week's rest and recovery. It didn't feel like it would be near enough to shift the exhaustion. Slipping a hand inside his pants he ran fingers across his abdomen just under his navel and could feel that already his scar was almost completely healed. The last remnants of the dissolving stitches had washed away in his morning shower the day before.

But with all the problems now facing him with a child to care for, there was still that _other_ problem. A second being was growing inside his body. He found it impossible to think of it as a baby. It was an unwanted invader, a foreign occupier; a thing from a hated well and now that his proper son was born, it was time to get rid of the intruder.

XXX

Rodney made it clear. "There's no risk to my son now, I want Kolya taken out of me."

Beckett, at Rodney's sudden appearance in the infirmary, halted in the middle of casting one of the cook's assistant's wrist, pausing with a strip of the plaster wrap still in his fingers. "Uh, perhaps you'd like to wait Rodney? I'm a bit busy here. We can discuss this in a few minutes."

Rodney had his hands clasped behind his back but with none of the characteristic self conscious uncertainty that often peppered his gestures. He was as still as a post, his face hard and determined. "Fine, but I'm not going to change my mind." But he did retreat at least and leave the doctor to finish his work on what-ever-his-name-was's wrist.

Beckett washed the white goop from his hands and sat heavily in his desk chair in the corner of the dispensary, some ways away from the infirmary beds, beckoning Rodney to take the seat opposite him. Papers and bandages littered the desk top. A computer screen buzzed with files and reports ready to be either read, reported on or written.

Beckett leaned back gratefully in his padded chair and clasped his hands together in his lap. "We already had this conversation Rodney."

"That was before. There's no risk to my son now."

"But there is still a risk to _you_."

"The fetus is still small. Come on Carson, you're supposed to be the best. You're telling me you can't perform the extraction of this one bit of tissue? That it's too complicated?"

"Even at this stage, it's still complicated. Abdominal surgery is never a simple matter. And I beg to differ. This is not a bit of tissue, it's a baby; _your_ baby."

"One I never asked for."

"That doesn't change that it's yours and that there's a risk to your health if I do this "extraction" as you put it."

Rodney stared at him long and hard and then turned his head away. "Are you saying that you refuse to do it?"

Beckett returned the stare but with compassion. "I'm sorry, but yes. In my opinion the risk to yourself is too great. Plus you have no idea whether...you may perhaps find out later..." It was difficult to put into words in this case. He had no idea how Rodney felt or what he was going through. To be raped and to bear the burden of that rape by an unwanted pregnancy as a constant reminder of that brutal attack. No one understood it, no one. Oh they had made all the correct noises and said all the right words, but no one really had any understanding of it. Maybe they got it intellectually, but did they _understand_? No.

Beckett finally said it the simplest way he knew how. "You may regret it."

Setting his jaw - "Not for a _minute_."

But the scientist seemed less certain. He also looked like he was going to fall down. "How are you sleeping Rodney?"

Ignoring the doctor's question "Stop trying to change the topic. Are you really not going to help me?"

"In this case my help would more than likely _hurt_ you. I am truly sorry, Rodney, about what happened to you. Have you been seeing Alderson?"

"Our local shrink? - sure. He asked me about my childhood and did I have any sexual hang-ups. Oh and he said if I worked real hard with him and ate all my vegetables I'd eventually – and I quote – "come to terms with it" which means in a nut shell I should just get over it." Rodney's tone reeked of sarcasm. "Yeah, _real_ helpful. Only he forgot about the part that I'll be stuck with a baby - Acustus Kolya's baby, a _rapist's_ baby - that I don't want and one which I will be stuck with it for the rest of my _life_. I mean, I can't send it back to Earth to be adopted now, can I? Since we'll be cut off from Earth probably forever."

Beckett had no idea what to say to his friend's very obvious distress, most of which he had up until now succeeded in hiding away from everyone. There was the possibility of adoption to someone in Atlantis but then Rodney would be forced to face the child in one way or another on a continuing basis. The nature of his work and his position on Sheppard's team meant Rodney interacted with most of the people in Atlantis, if not on a daily, certainly on a regular basis. But there was also the mainland. Perhaps someone there might be willing to take on the child. "Rodney..."

"No, never mind. If you won't help me, I'll see about finding someone from the mainland who'll do it. The Athosian's still have a doctor – don't they – of sorts? Maybe they'll agree to a trade - one abortion for a few boxes of MRE's or something."

"Rodney." Beckett stood up. "Please don't go to the mainland. They do not have the equipment for this, and you're not thinking straight right now. I think you need to take a longer break from work. Let me talk to colonel Sheppard, we'll make arrangements for more time off or-"

"-Or what Carson? A beach party? Some sun and surf?" Rodney stared at him, his eyes almost wild with grief. "Is that supposed to cure everything? Make me feel okay about having been..." He swallowed. "About...my whole life being blown away? About being a father when I'm in no way qualified or know what the hell I'm doing...?" He bit his lip and Beckett could see the tears puddle-ing on his lower lids. "I don't know how I'm going to – I have no idea how to raise a child. I'm a fuck-up Carson, I hate kids...I just gave birth to a kid and I'm probably going to...let's face it I-I'm _kidding_ myself here, how...how am I going to...to..."

Rodney turned his head to one side and then the other as though searching for an out, a turn of the road, an answer – hoping for something - _anything_ - to arrive and alter his reality as it stood. To save him. "Excuse me." He whispered and swiftly turned on his heel and walked away, his shoulders slumped, one hand rubbing across his eyes.

"Oh dear me." Beckett said opened a private link on his comm.. "Beckett to Ronan, please come in..."

XXX

Ronan located the scientist at one of his usual haunts, a small, little-used balcony isolated from the busiest parts of the city, one that looked out across the western sea to the moons that mostly rose in a jagged line. He knew the physicist loved it here and came often when he was stressed or just wanted to be alone.

"Hey." He said and took a seat beside McKay. Rodney was leaning up against the marble wall, his knees tucked up to his chest and his hands clasped around them. He appeared more stiff than relaxed.

Rodney did not turn his head but after a minute decided that it was stupid not to respond. "Hi." He finally said and then sighed. "I suppose Carson called you?"

"Yup. 'Said you needed some help."

Rodney nodded. "He's probably right. Damn uppity Scotsman." He stared out across the water. So beautiful and looking so calm, at least from a distance. "I was hoping the sea, looking at it I mean, would calm me, make me feel better about...everything."

"Is it?"

Tears had been threatening to fall ever since he had stepped back through the Gate and now they did. It was useless to try and stop them now. He felt over-filled with sadness. Chock full of anger and grief and a stew of hard emotions he couldn't even pin down. They were there now always below the surface of his chest, beating their fists at him to get out. "No."

Ronan slipped an easy arm around the smaller man's shoulders. "We're your friends Rodney. You don't have to go through this alone."

Once the tears had started though, they wouldn't stop so easily as that and he let them fall, all the while trying to think up a good reason why he _didn't_ need their help, trying to talk himself into being strong enough to endure on his own, to be the great Doctor Meredith Rodney McKay, human dynamo. "I'm..._really_ tired."

"I know."

"I don't how to be a father."

"Nobody does at first."

"I'm going to ruin our son."

"No you won't."

"I don't know what I'm doing. I don't even _like_ kids. I'm not...a very good person."

"But_ I_ like you."

Rodney wiped at his eyes and turned a red face to his big friend. "_Stop_ being so damn nice!"

Ronan shrugged. "Can't help it, Rodney, you're my mate."

"That's just..._stupid_."

Ronan took exception to that and took Rodney's chin in one hand, forcing the scientist to look at him, straight at him, right into his stern brown eyes, "No, Rodney, it's_ not_." Then he kissed him very gently.

When he let him go Rodney drew back, not too far, and looked up at him. Then he turned and looked back out to the rolling sea where a wind had whipped the waves into white caps. "Um...so you were saying something about h-helping me...maybe doing this together...you know...m-maybe moving in together or something...not that we _have_ to I just thought it's be easier, you know, and since you brought it up already..."

"Yeah." Ronan looked over at his most brilliant, most confusing, most infuriating, most stubborn but most captivating little mate. "Yeah, I want to."

"Okay but I want to stay in my place. My place is bigger."

"Okay."

"Because there's no way I'm moving into that tiny, dirty sock-infested cave you call a room."

"Fine."

"And I'm not cleaning up after you."

"Me neither."

"Good. And I hate cooking."

"I eat in the Mess."

"Good, me too. And I like to sleep in on my days off."

"I like to go running first thing."

"Okay we'll have to trade off days. We can't leave Junior alone you know."

"Of course not." Ronan kissed his cheek. "Where is he by the way?"

"Stackhouse is watching him."

"Good. So what are we going to call him?"

Rodney now turned at stared at him, his eyes round. "Oh shit. I haven't...I mean with everything...I actually hadn't gotten around to that yet."

"Then I'd like a Satedan naming ceremony."

"Oh God, is this some sort of weirdness done under the moonlight dressed in leaves and where everyone is chanting and shaking rattles? It _is_ isn't it?"

Ronan looked at him strangely, realising that his mate wasn't perhaps as right in the head as he used to be. "No, it's where we invite our friends to a meal and tell them the name we've chosen."

Rodney blinked. "Oh. Oh well, that sounds okay I guess. No rattles?"

"No rattles." Ronan laughed then and planted a hard kiss on his lover's tear-stained splotchy face. "Come on." He stood and drew Rodney to his feet all in one smooth motion, making his exhausted lover almost topple over the other way. "Let's go see Junior."

XXX

Part IX asap


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